About Us

Dr. Hachigian is a co-founder and vice president, strategy and operations at Be Biopharma. Prior to joining Be Bio, she was a principal at Longwood Fund where she co-founded ImmuneID (founding CEO and current director), TScan Therapeutics (founding president and director) and Immunitas Therapeutics (founding president and director). Lea has driven all aspects of company creation, including private financings, scientific strategy, business development, team building and early operations. Together, companies she has co-founded at Longwood Fund have raised over $250 million in venture financing and entered collaborations with leading industry partners. Additionally, Lea served as a member of the Longwood Fund investment team, leading diligence and deal efforts across all areas of early-stage platform and therapeutics companies.

Lea received her Ph.D. from MIT in molecular and cellular neuroscience where she was a NSF Graduate Research Fellow. As a graduate student in the Heiman Lab at the Broad Institute, she studied the determinants of neuronal identity and vulnerability in disease. Prior to her doctorate, Lea received an A.B. from Harvard University where she graduated magna cum laude with highest honors in neurobiology and received a certificate in mind brain and behavior. While at Harvard, Lea researched genetic models of developmental disorders in the Fagiolini/Hensch lab at Children’s Hospital/Harvard Medical School. She has received numerous fellowships for her research and multiple teaching awards for her work with both undergraduate and graduate students. Lea was named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 list for healthcare for her work as a co-founder of TScan Therapeutics.

The bulk of Dr. Morgan’s career was at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) where he led a series of laboratories in the field of cell and gene therapy. He was a member of the team that published the first approved human gene transfer experiment in 1990 (N. Engl. J. Med. 323:570, 1990). Early in his career, he focused on the first-in-human applications of gene therapy for genetic diseases such as severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID) and research into gene therapy for hemophilia. He also led major research efforts into the application of gene therapy for infectious disease, specifically on HIV/AIDS, including one of the first clinical trials testing anti-HIV gene therapy in humans. He later switched focus to concentrate on cancer immunotherapy. Rick has extensively published on T-cell receptor (TCR) gene therapy and was the lead author on the first report where this technology was shown to mediate cancer regression in patients (Science 314:126, 2006).

In 2013, Rick made the switch from academia to industry to lead the immunotherapy efforts at bluebird bio where he was vice president of immunotherapy. Major accomplishments at bluebird include driving all pre-clinical activities for bluebird’s first oncology asset for the treatment of multiple myeloma, an anti-BCMA CAR. The successful clinical application of this technology was published in the New England Journal of Medicine (N Engl J Med. 2019 May 2;380(18):1726-1737), culminating in the approval of this approach as medicine (Abecma) in 2021. In 2018, Rick moved to Editas Medicine as senior vice president of immunogenetics where he focused on gene editing applications in immunotherapy. At Editas, he led the development of off-the-shelf cellular treatments for cancer immunotherapy using gene edited NK cells. Externally, Rick served as a member of the board of directors of the American Society of Gene and Cell Therapy (ASGCT), and he is a member of the scientific advisory board of the Keystone symposia.

Rick is an author of more than 200 scientific publications including papers with Nobel laureates EJ Corey, Harold Varmus and Andrew Fire. Rick holds a B.A. in biochemistry from Brandeis University and a Ph.D. in genetics from The Johns Hopkins University.

Dr. Joanne Smith-Farrell is a mission-driven executive whose career has been devoted to leading teams conquering cancer and life-limiting disease.

Joanne joined Be Bio as chief executive officer in February of 2021, where she leads a committed team of scientists, drug developers, business builders and cell therapy operational specialists, united in one common mission – to fully unleash the power of engineered B cell medicines to provide previously impossible solutions across a wide range of therapeutic areas to patients with many of today’s least tractable diseases.

Prior to joining Be Bio, Joanne was the chief operating officer and business unit head, oncology at bluebird bio, where she led the growth of bluebird Oncology. Joanne established and led the team that transformed an early single-candidate effort within a rare disease gene therapy company to a leading oncology cell therapy business encompassing Abecma, a transformative, first-in-class CAR-T medicine for patients with multiple myeloma, a full portfolio of clinical and near-clinical cell therapies, a research engine producing one to two new investigational new drugs per year, and a team of more than 400 employees with full research and development, commercial manufacturing infrastructure and capabilities. Prior to this Joanne held executive leadership roles as the chief business officer of bluebird bio, vice president of transactions at Merck, vice president of business development at Pfizer, and senior vice president of global business development at Gene Logic.  Before entering industry, Joanne was a consultant within the healthcare practice at The Boston Consulting Group, a principal investigator at The Vitreous State Laboratories and a staff scientist at The Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory.

Joanne conducted her post-doctoral research in biomedical engineering in Professor Robert Langer’s lab at the Harvard-MIT Division for Health Science and Technology where she received the National Service in Research Award Fellowship from the National Institutes of Health. She holds a Ph.D. in physics from The Catholic University of America where she was a Herzfeld Scholar and held the Hubbard Fellowship, and a B.S. in physics and mathematics from Vanderbilt University.

Dr. Krishnan Viswanadhan is a biopharmaceutical executive with over 20 years of broad cross-functional experience in advancing new medicines for patients with serious and life-threatening diseases. Krishnan joined Be Bio as president and chief operating officer, where he is responsible in driving all operational aspects of the business to unleash the power of engineered B cell medicines as therapeutics for patients with serious diseases.

Prior to Be Bio, Krishnan was senior vice president, global cell therapy franchise lead at Bristol Myers Squibb (BMS) where he was responsible for overseeing the integrated cell therapy franchise strategy across the enterprise including building core capabilities including key investments to support long term growth. He oversaw the teams responsible for the development, approval and life cycle management of Breyanzi, a CD19 CAR-T and Abecma, the first BCMA CAR T therapy.

Prior to BMS, Krishnan was vice president, business development and global alliances at Celgene Corporation responsible for managing the portfolio of partnerships and equity investments. Prior to Celgene, Krishnan had roles in large and small companies in regulatory strategy.

Krishnan is a registered pharmacist and received his Pharm.D. from Rutgers University and holds an MBA degree from Cornell University. Krishnan currently serves the board as a non-executive director of JW Therapeutics, a leading cell therapy company in China.

Brad Hartman is a purpose-driven biotech executive and entrepreneur who is deeply committed to unlocking the potential in individuals, teams and the company to radically improve patients’ lives. He passionately believes in the power of culture to elevate organizational performance and capability through innovative People practices and a more humanistic, caring approach.

Brad has spent the past 15 years building teams and culture at biotech companies from early research stages through commercialization. He has deep cell and gene therapy experience from Unum Therapeutics (CAR-T) as well as FerGene (gene therapy), where he recently served as the chief people officer. Brad has played a significant role in launching multiple innovative therapies, including Kalydeco® (cystic fibrosis), Kalbitor® (hereditary angioedema) and Incivek® (hepatitis C), which was one of the fastest blockbuster drug launches of all time. Brad also founded and built out his own Executive Search firm, ConnectedSearch, into a leading life science search practice.

Brad received his B.S. in neuroscience from the University of Rochester and worked at both the National Cancer Institute and the Graduate School of Pharmacology at the University of Rochester in cellular pharmacology.

Jason Rhodes is a partner at Atlas Venture and focuses on creating and building novel therapeutics companies. He is the chairman and was the founding CEO of Generation Bio (NASDAQ: GBIO) and Dyne Therapeutics (NASDAQ: DYN). He is also on the boards of Replimune (NASDAQ: REPL), Gemini Therapeutics and Accent Therapeutics. He was the chairman and founding CEO of Disarm Therapeutics which was acquired by Eli Lilly in 2020.

David Lubner is a senior finance executive with more than 25 years of experience in the life sciences industry. Mr. Lubner served as executive vice president and chief financial officer of Ra Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq: RARX) until May 2020 following its acquisition by UCB S.A. Prior to Ra Pharma, he was senior vice president and chief financial officer of Tetraphase Pharmaceuticals and was previously chief financial officer of PharMetrics Inc., a leading patient-based pharmacy and medical claims data informatics company until it was acquired by IMS Health in 2015. He was also chief financial officer at ProScript, where Velcade® (bortezomib), a therapy widely used for the treatment of the blood cancer multiple myeloma, was discovered.

David serves on the board of directors of Dyne Therapeutics, Inc. (Nasdaq: DYN), Vor Biopharma, Inc. (Nasdaq: VOR), Point Biopharma (Nasdaq: PNT) and several other private biotech companies. David previously served on the board of directors of Nightstar Therapeutics plc, (formerly Nasdaq: NITE), focused on the development of one-time retinal gene therapies for patients suffering from rare inherited retinal diseases, acquired by Biogen in June 2019 and Therapeutics Acquisition Corporation (formerly Nasdaq: RACA), a blank check company focused on the healthcare industry. David is a member of the American Institute of CPAs and a certified public accountant in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. David received his B.S. in business administration from Northeastern University and an M.S. in taxation from Bentley University.

Dr. Backstrom was most recently executive vice president, head of research and development at Acceleron Pharma. Prior to Acceleron, he held clinical research and development positions of increasing responsibility during his tenure at Celgene, from 2008 to 2019; eventually serving as Celgene’s chief medical officer and head of regulatory affairs.

Prior to Celgene, he served as vice president, global medical affairs and safety at Pharmion. Jay began his career in industry in 1990 at Marion Merrell Dow and continued as part of its successor companies including Hoechst Marion Roussel, where he held positions in clinical research and global drug surveillance and pharmacoepidemiology. He also spent nearly three years at Quintiles in medical and scientific services, including therapeutic head, cardiovascular, respiratory and critical care, where he oversaw extensive clinical work across a variety of cardiovascular and pulmonary diseases.

Prior to his move to industry, Jay served as staff physician and medical director of the Samuel U. Rodgers Community Health Center in Kansas City, Missouri. Jay holds an M.D. from Temple University School of Medicine and received post-graduate training in Internal Medicine at Temple University Hospital. He also earned a Master’s in public health from Saint Louis University School of Public Health.

Mr. Steinberg is a general partner at Longwood Fund and chief executive officer and co-founder of Longwood portfolio company Pyxis Oncology. Previously, David was at PureTech Health, (LSE: PRTC), a biotech incubator which he co-founded and served as chief innovation officer, focusing on venture creation, investing, and launching innovative biotech companies. David was the co-founder and CEO of several biotech companies, including Longwood-founded Pyxis Oncology, Vedanta Biosciences, Calix, Vor Biopharma, and was co-founder of Restorbio (NASDAQ: TORC). He previously worked in biopharma strategy consulting at Boston Consulting Group and Vertex Partners, and research and development at P&G Pharmaceuticals. He received his MBA in strategy and finance from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and holds a B.A. in biology from Cornell University.

Dan Janney is the managing partner of Alta Partners. Dan Janney joined Alta Partners at its founding in 1996. He has nearly 25 years of successful early stage investing experience in life sciences. Dan’s focus on working with talented entrepreneurs to create companies around novel insights in biology and new approaches to drug discovery has led to the funding and development of 35 companies. Prior to Alta, Dan was a senior investment banker at Montgomery Securities.

Dan is currently on the board of directors of several public and private companies, including Allakos (NASDAQ:ALLK), Be Biopharma, Curasen Therapeutics, ImmuneID, Krystal Biotech (NASDAQ:KYRS), Lassen Therapeutics, Novome Biotechnologies and Prolacta Bioscience. In addition, he led Alta’s investments in Astex Pharmaceuticals (acquired by Supergen), Cellective (acquired by Medimmune), ChemGenex (ASX:CXS acquired by Cephalon), CoTherix (NASDAQ:CTRX acquired by Actellion), Definity Health (acquired by United Health), Dynavax (NASDAQ:DVAX), Endonetics (acquired by Medtronic), Esperion Therapeutics (NASDAQ:ESPR), Ilex Oncology (NASDAQ:ILXO acquired by Millennium Pharmaceuticals), InterMune (NASDAQ:ITMN acquired by Roche), LJL Biosystems (NASDAQ:LJLB acquired by Molecular Devices), Mako Surgical (NASDAQ:MAKO acquired by Stryker) and Triangle Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:VIRS acquired by Gilead).

Dan is a member of the president’s council of the J. David Gladstone Institutes and the chair of the board of directors of the California Academy of Sciences. He also serves on the Board of Regents of Georgetown University. He holds a B.A. from Georgetown University and an MBA from the Anderson School at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Laura Tadvalkar is a Principal on the venture team at RA Capital Management. Laura works on new company creation and early-stage investments and serves on the board of directors of Expansion Therapeutics, Hemab, and Aliada Therapeutics. Laura has a B.S. in Chemistry from Yale University and a Ph.D. in Chemical Biology from Harvard University. Prior to RA, Laura was a Principal at MP Healthcare Venture Management. Prior to MP, she was a Consultant at Clarion Healthcare.

Dr. Joanne Smith-Farrell is a mission-driven executive whose career has been devoted to leading teams conquering cancer and life-limiting disease.

Dr. Smith-Farrell joined Be Bio as chief executive officer in February of 2021, where she leads a committed team of scientists, drug developers, business builders and cell therapy operational specialists, united in one common mission – to fully unleash the power of engineered B cell medicines to provide previously impossible solutions across a wide range of therapeutic areas to patients with many of today’s least tractable diseases.

Prior to joining Be Bio, Joanne was the chief operating officer and business unit head, oncology at bluebird bio, where she led the growth of bluebird Oncology. Joanne established and led the team that transformed an early single-candidate effort within a rare disease gene therapy company to a leading oncology cell therapy business encompassing Abecma, a transformative, first-in-class CAR-T medicine for patients with multiple myeloma, a full portfolio of clinical and near-clinical cell therapies, a research engine producing one to two new investigational new drugs per year, and a team of more than 400 with full research and development, commercial manufacturing infrastructure and capabilities. Prior to this Dr. Smith-Farrell held executive leadership roles as the chief business officer of bluebird bio, vice president of transactions at Merck, vice president of business development at Pfizer, and senior vice president of global business development at Gene Logic.  Before entering industry, Joanne was a consultant within the healthcare practice at The Boston Consulting Group, a principal investigator at The Vitreous State Laboratories and a staff scientist at The Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory.

Dr. Smith-Farrell conducted her post-doctoral research in biomedical engineering in Professor Robert Langer’s lab at the Harvard-MIT Division for Health Science and Technology where she received the National Service in Research Award Fellowship from the National Institutes of Health. She holds a Ph.D. in physics from The Catholic University of America where she was a Herzfeld Scholar and held the Hubbard Fellowship, and a B.S. in physics and mathematics from Vanderbilt University.

Dr. Gillis is a Managing Director at ARCH Venture Partners, where he joined in 2005. He is focused on the evaluation of new life science technologies and on the development and growth of ARCH’s biotechnology portfolio companies.

He is a director of Homology Medicines (FIXX) and Carrick Therapeutics. He serves as Director and Chairman of Codiak Biosciences (CDAK), Faraday Pharmaceuticals, eGenesis, HiberCell, Skylark Bio, Walden Biosciences, OncoResponse, Mozart Therapeutics, Bitterroot Bio and VBI Vaccines (VBIV). Dr. Gillis also serves as a director of Takeda Pharmaceuticals (TAK).

Dr. Gillis was a founder and director of Corixa Corp. and served as CEO from its inception and as its Chairman from 1999 until its acquisition in 2005 by GlaxoSmithKline. Prior to Corixa, Dr. Gillis was a founder and director of Immunex Corp., the most successful venture-funded biotech company in the state of Washington. From 1981 until his departure in 1994, he served as Immunex’s Director of Research and Development, Chief Scientific Officer, and as CEO of Immunex’s R&D subsidiary. Dr. Gillis was interim CEO of Immunex Corp. following its majority purchase by American Cyanamid Co. and remained a member of the board until 1997. Amgen, Inc. acquired Immunex in 2002.

Dr. Gillis is an immunologist by training with over 300 peer-reviewed publications in the areas of molecular and tumor immunology. He is credited as being a pioneer in the field of cytokines and cytokine receptors, directing the development of multiple marketed products including Leukine, (GM-CSF), Prokine (IL-2) and Enbrel (soluble TNF receptor-Fc fusion protein) as well as the regulatory approval of Bexxar (radiolabeled anti-CD20).

Dr. Gillis received a B.A. from Williams College and a Ph.D. from Dartmouth College.

Eun-Hyung Lee, MD is an associate professor in pulmonary, allergy, critical care, and sleep medicine and the Lowance Center for Human Immunology in the department of medicine at Emory University and the director of the emory asthma, allergy, immunology program. Frances is also a member of the Emory Vaccine Center and Center for Childhood Infections and Vaccines (CCIV) at the Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta. Her research focus is to understand the biology of human protective and pathogenic plasma cells in health and disease in blood, bone marrow (BM) and respiratory tissues. Her laboratory has identified a unique phenotype of human long-lived plasma cells (LLPC) in the BM and the special survival factors within the BM microniche where LLPC reside. Using the different qualities of the human plasmablasts/antibody secreting cells (ASC) in the blood, respiratory tissues and bone marrow, she is interested in understanding the molecular mechanisms of LLPC maturation and maintenance. She also pioneered using a novel matrix from circulating ASC in the blood called MENSA (media enriched with newly synthesized antibodies) to diagnose acute viral, bacterial and fungal infections.

Frances completed her undergraduate and medical school education at the Johns Hopkins University. She trained in internal medicine at the University of Rochester Medical Center (URMC), served as chief medical resident, and then completed her pulmonary & critical care medicine fellowship at Boston University and URMC. She stayed on as faculty at URMC until she eventually moved to Emory University in 2012. Frances is an NIH study section member and ad hoc reviewer for various grant programs and journals. She also co-leads a project from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to develop human B cell therapies.

David J. Rawlings, M.D., is chief in the division of immunology, overseeing the immunodeficiency clinic at Seattle Children’s Hospital. He is also director of the Center for Immunity and Immunotherapies leading the immunology research programs at Seattle Children’s Research Institute. David is professor of pediatrics and adjunct professor in the Department of Immunology at the University of Washington School of Medicine.

He earned his M.D. with honors from the University of North Carolina School of Medicine and completed a residency and chief residency in pediatrics at the University of California, San Francisco. He was an intramural research fellow at the NIH and a senior fellow at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, UCLA. He completed specialty training in pediatric rheumatology and immunology at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and directed the pediatric rheumatology program at UCLA. David has been the recipient of many awards including election to the American Society for Clinical Investigation, Association of American Physicians and the Children’s Hospital Guild Association Endowed Chair in Pediatric Immunology Research. David also co-directs the Northwest Genome Engineering Consortium, a research program funded as part of the NIH Roadmap for Medical Research and focused on developing enzymatic reagents and delivery methods for site specific gene repair in hematopoietic stem cells. His publications include more than 90 peer-reviewed papers and many invited reviews.

David is a member of multiple regional and national organizations, an NIH study section member, chairman for the USIDNET XLA patient registry, and ad hoc reviewer for various grant programs and immunology journals. He also co-directs the Northwest Genome Engineering Consortium, a research program funded as part of the NIH Roadmap focused on developing enzymatic reagents and delivery methods for site specific gene repair in hematopoietic stem cells.

Dr. Shiv Pillai is a professor of medicine and health sciences & technology (HST) at Harvard Medical School. He is the program director of the NIH-funded Autoimmune Center of Excellence at Massachusetts General Hospital and the director of the Harvard immunology Ph.D. and master’s in medical sciences programs. Shiv is also director of MD-student research for the Harvard-MIT HST program. He is a group leader at the Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT and Harvard; a member of the MGH Cancer Center; and an associate member of the Broad Institute.

Shiv is a world leader in the study of fundamental B-cell immunology. His laboratory at MGH postulated and provided evidence for the first ligand-independent signaling model during lymphocyte development, now a widely accepted mechanism for both pre-B receptor and pre-T receptor signaling. Shiv’s laboratory also showed that Btk, the product of the gene mutated in X-linked agammaglobulinemia, is functionally linked to the pre-B receptor and the B-cell receptor. Btk inhibitors are now widely used in lymphoid malignancies and autoimmunity. In addition, his group defined a functional niche for B cells (around sinusoids in the bone marrow); identified the first two mutants that abrogate marginal-zone B-lymphocyte development; developed the concept of a follicular versus marginal zone B-lymphoid cell-fate decision; and discovered two new defined stages of peripheral B-cell development, the marginal zone precursor (MZP) B cell and the follicular type II B cell.

In addition, Shiv’s work has contributed to breakthroughs in understanding the pathogenic mechanisms underlying an autoimmune fibrotic disorder, IgG4-related disease, with ongoing investigations involving the study of systemic sclerosis and common variable immunodeficiency (CVID). These findings have generated several clinical trials targeting the activated lymphocytes responsible for chronic inflammation and fibrosis in patients with these autoimmune disorders.

Shiv is the author of a monograph “Lymphocyte Development” and co-author with Abul Abbas and Andrew Lichtman of two widely used textbooks of immunology. He is the course director of immunology courses at Harvard Medical School and Harvard College and for the Federation of Clinical Immunology Societies. Shiv received a medical degree from Christian Medical College in Vellore, India, and a doctorate in biochemistry from Calcutta University. He subsequently completed postdoctoral training in the lab of David Baltimore at MIT.

Dr. Richard James is an associate professor in pediatrics and pharmacology at the University of Washington and a principal investigator at Seattle Children’s Research Institute. Richard’s research is focused on understanding how genetic variants lead to dysregulated signaling in lymphoma and in immune dysregulation. He is the co-leader of the B cell engineering program at Seattle Children’s.

Plasma cells are dedicated protein producing machines. The James lab is interested in understanding which proteins are responsible for differentiation of B cells into plasma cells including: activation of naive B cells, response to T cell help, plasmablast expansion and antibody production on a per cell basis. The James lab recently developed genome engineering techniques that can be used to edit primary human B cells, which can subsequently differentiate into plasma cells ex vivo. In collaboration with other projects, Richard uses genome engineering to ask whether oncogenic variants associated with lymphoma or those associated with lupus alter B cell development. Richard is also developing new ways to express and secrete human proteins in plasma cells, with the eventual goal of developing engineered plasma cells as immunotherapies for diseases caused by defects in secreted proteins (e.g. hemophilia).

Dr. Cyster is an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and professor and vice-chair in the department of microbiology and immunology at the University of California, San Francisco. He graduated from the University of Western Australia with a B.S. honors degree in biochemistry and microbiology and completed a Ph.D. in immunology at the University of Oxford in the laboratory of Alan Williams. He was a postdoctoral fellow in immunology at Stanford University with Christopher Goodnow and he joined the faculty at UCSF in 1995.

Jason is internationally recognized for defining how lymphoid microenvironments are organized to support adaptive immunity. His lab played a key role in the discovery of lymphoid tissue chemokines and established the concept that chemokines continuously guide cells to supportive niches.

Jason’s group led the way in defining how cells exit from lymphoid organs, a process essential for immune function. His team established the egress-promoting role of sphingosine-1-phosphate and identified the mechanism of action of key egress regulators. He has been a leader in applying two-photon microscopy to unraveling antigen-encounter and immune cell migration dynamics. He received the 2005 AAI BD Biosciences Investigator Award in recognition of outstanding contributions in immunology and the 2018 AAI Biolegend Herzenberg Award for outstanding contributions in B cell biology. He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2014 and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2018.