Who we are

Steven Collens is CEO of MATTER, the healthcare technology incubator and innovation center. MATTER opened in February 2015 and nurtures entrepreneurs and innovators building next-generation health IT, medical device, diagnostic and biopharma technologies. MATTER works with more than 200 healthcare technology ventures and the company partners with dozens of industry-leading companies, health systems and universities. Steven is also senior advisor at Pritzker Group Venture Capital.

Prior to assuming his current role, Steven was senior vice president at Pritzker Group, the investment firm led by Tony and J.B. Pritzker. In that capacity, he led the team that created 1871, Chicago’s center for digital startups that now houses more than 400 early-stage companies. He previously worked at Abbott in a variety of domestic and international functions, including product management, policy and public affairs. In 2005, Steven helped found ConstantWellness.com to give patients control over their health data and allow healthcare providers to coordinate care of their patients. Prior to Abbott, Steven served as legislative assistant to U.S. Senator Carol Moseley-Braun.

Steven holds an MBA from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management and a BA from Washington University in St. Louis. He serves on the boards of 1871, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago and the Chicago High School for the Arts, and is a member of ChicagoNEXT, Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s council on technology and innovation. He is also a Leadership Greater Chicago fellow and a member of the Economic Club of Chicago and the Commercial Club of Chicago.

Charlene is the Chief of Staff at MATTER. In this role, she champions MATTER’s company-wide strategic initiatives and finds ways for MATTER to continuously improve and evolve. She works to align the MATTER organization and promotes operational process effectiveness, enabling our teams to focus on delivering value to the MATTER community.

Coming from a management consulting background, Charlene brings experience managing cross-functional programs and leading teams from planning through to execution. Prior to joining MATTER, she spent four years guiding clients through performing due diligence and executing complex merger and acquisition deals. In this capacity, she has represented clients from both the buy side and sell side of transactions. Charlene also brings deep operations and supply chain expertise, and previously also spent four years advising on end-to-end operational excellence for both manufacturing and service companies. She is an APICS Certified Supply Chain Professional.

Carrie joins MATTER as a highly motivated executive assistant with more than 15 years of experience working with diverse senior leadership. After working in the commercial real estate and legal industries, she brings her creativity and passion to support, contribute and support a team of executives who make a difference.   Carrie has a BFA in theatre design and technology from Wright State University. She worked as a stage manager and light designer across the Chicagoland area as well as serving as a master electrician at the Court Theatre.

As a venture acceleration coordinator at MATTER, Klaudia is responsible for the venture acceleration team’s data management, as well as learning and development programs for startups like the Mentor Clinic and PointB program. As a recent graduate of Northwestern University with a degree in psychology and global health, Klaudia is interested in learning more about how startups are able to navigate the complicated healthcare landscape to push their ideas and innovations to become the standard in healthcare.

Prior to working at MATTER, Klaudia focused her time on leading an independent research project in Northwestern’s School of Education and Social Policy and completed a thesis on the impact of parents’ attachment on their emotions in conversation with their children.

Jeana is a strategic marketer obsessed with audience engagement at the intersection of healthcare and technology. Previously, she ran her own marketing services company with clients throughout the tech and healthcare sectors. Jeana served as the operational lead at a San Francisco based agency working on programs for remote patient monitoring, telehealth products and robotic surgical systems. She also directed cross-functional teams at Meredith’s marketing division, MXM (formerly Big Communications), on more than 26 pharmaceutical and payer launches.

Jeana holds a bachelor of arts in sociology from the University of Maryland, College Park and is a member of the Healthcare Businesswoman’s Association.

As the partnerships manager at MATTER, Katie is responsible for building strategic relationships with partners that create reciprocal value. She works to help partners source new technologies, build innovation capacity and solve complex problems. Prior to MATTER, Katie worked in corporate partnership development at mHUB, an innovation center for manufacturing and hardtech. Prior to mHUB, Katie managed national sponsorships at Tribune Publishing and was part of the team at Jack Morton Worldwide where she coordinated experiential marketing campaigns for General Motors. Katie graduated from Michigan State University with a degree in Marketing.

Priyanca joined the programs team in order to facilitate strategic programming at MATTER. Priyanca has a strong research background as she spent nearly five years working at NORC at the University of Chicago providing monitoring and technical assistance support to various federal healthcare initiatives at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to inform health policy. She received her masters in international health economics from the London School of Economics and an undergraduate degree in business economics.

As MATTER’s marketing manager, Caitlin works with the digital marketing team to engage the MATTER community through the MATTER website, blog, email and social media. She has a passion for helping mission-driven organizations connect with their audiences through storytelling and has worked with a variety of nonprofits and social impact organizations to help them build and scale their digital presences. In her previous role at Carthage College, she developed an engagement strategy for young alumni, collaborated on the college’s first 24-hour giving challenge and launched an alumni mentorship program. She studied communications, digital media and music at Carthage College.

Nick is a Chicagoland native and a recent graduate of Loyola University Chicago’s Health Systems Management program. Before joining the MATTER team, Nick interned at Loyola University Medical Center, drafting an education plan for the Trinity Health network on the state of alternatives to opioids in the United States. He also held leadership roles at Loyola through various student-employed departments. During his sophomore year, Nick contributed to organizing a medical mission to Cusco, Peru that provided access to basic healthcare for over 1,000 people in remote locations.

As the events coordinator, Kay supports the events manager in developing, coordinating and executing MATTER’s diverse events.

Prior to joining MATTER, Kay was a corporate events intern at MxD (formerly known as UI LABS) and assisted the events team with coordinating meetings, forums, seminars and workshops for members and third parties.

Kay has worked in the outdoor recreation industry for five years, starting as a group development and challenge course facilitator in college. In this role, Kay organized group development programs for over 1,600 students that challenged their perspectives and focused on group cohesion.

Kay graduated from Loyola University Chicago with a B.A. in advertising and public relations and a marketing minor.

When not working on events, Kay spends her free time outside in the sun. She loves to hike, bike, climb and travel.

Sabrina is MATTER’s director of corporate innovation and strategy. In this role she works with our partner companies and organizations to help them achieve their innovation goals. Sabrina has fifteen years of corporate strategy and advisory experience with the nation’s top companies and government institutions. She most recently served in a chief of staff role at the Federal Reserve, leading operational effectiveness and strategic planning for their largest division. Prior to that, she was a senior consultant at Ernst & Young LLP, an internal risk consultant at UnitedHealth Group, and an independent consultant for United Nations Development Program (UNDP).

Sabrina is currently a Truman National Security Fellow and former founder of DiversityBoom, a platform for women leaders of color. She was awarded the German Marshall Funds Leadership Exchange in Japan, and the Department of State Critical Language Scholarship in Bangladesh. Her commentary has been featured in US News and World Report and the Illinois State Journal Register. She holds a Bachelor of Science from the University of Illinois, and a Master of International Affairs from the Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs.

Joe joins MATTER as VP of Strategic Partnerships- working to expand the MATTER community through engagement with established businesses and organizations. Prior to joining MATTER, Joe was SVP of Client Solutions at machine-learning pioneer Ditto Labs. There, he worked with MIT-trained engineers to integrate cutting edge computer visioning solutions with leading technology from partners such as Oracle, Teradata and IBM. Joe was the first industry expert hired by healthcare and direct marketing agency BIG Communications, now part of media giant Meredith Corporation, to run global sales efforts and expand BIG’s offerings. Joe has launched over 30 products and devices over his career, gaining valuable insights on the most effective ways to commercialize. Joe began his career at Pfizer, working in sales and marketing for some of the world’s most recognized brands, such as Lipitor and Viagra. An entrepreneur himself, Joe co-founded San Francisco-based BrandForce Health- a company that launched some of the first connected, wireless health products in conjunction with AT&T, CVS and NantHealth.

Noelle is a Chicago native who graduated from Kalamazoo College in 2012 with a major in biology and a minor in art. During her junior year, she studied and lived abroad in Ecuador for 6 months. While in college she held a leadership role on the Student Activities Committee and was a senior resident assistant. After college, she learned HTML/CSS and UX Design at The Starter League, later becoming Start League’s office manager. Before joining The Starter League team, she worked at The University of Chicago Survey Lab administering surveys via phone in English and Spanish.

As events associate, Casey supports the development, production and execution of MATTER’s many events. Before joining the MATTER team, she worked in marketing and communications at the Dermatology Foundation for two years, furthering her affinity for the healthcare space. Casey graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a bachelor of arts in journalism and a certificate in gender and women’s studies. There she excelled in multiple internships with Madison area nonprofits, fostering her love for bettering the world and helping others.

Sam is the partnerships manager at MATTER. She is responsible for bridging the gap between partners and entrepreneurs in the MATTER workspace. Working with the partnership team, she strives to help partners get the most out of their relationship with MATTER to help with new technology, facilitate different programs and build innovation within organizations.

Sam’s background in the healthcare field started with a health sciences degree from Ohio State. While in college, she worked at a physical therapy clinic as an office coordinator and exercise technician. She used this experience to transition to the health tech world and worked for four years on the training team for Allscripts’ Ambulatory Product TouchWorks. She also ran the GiveBack Program at Allscripts for their headquarters office, planning the philanthropic and fundraising events the company took part in each year.

Peter Strandquist brings over 20 years of customer experience leadership, excellence and creativity to MATTER. Peter joined MATTER in November of 2017 as Director of Service Delivery.

Throughout his career, Peter has consistently built strong teams who have delivered the highest levels of service across multiple industries.

Peter has a genuine commitment to building lasting professional relationships and is focused on developing a meaningful and unique service experience for all MATTER guests.

Peter is a graduate of DePaul University, a proud United States Marine Corps veteran and an avid volunteer mentor.

As a venture acceleration associate at MATTER, LaShantay manages the end-to-end process of membership for our startup companies. This includes helping startups connect their needs and aspirations with the resources that MATTER can provide to grow and scale their businesses, as well as leverage their innovative technologies to advance care and improve lives.

Before joining MATTER, LaShantay completed her Master of Science in technology entrepreneurship at the University of Notre Dame. During her studies, she partnered with a startup and non-profit with a mission to bring renewable energy to refugee camps. This is where LaShantay developed her passion for entrepreneurship and improving lives through science.

Courtney leads the venture acceleration team at MATTER. She focuses on helping startups grow and scale their businesses, as well as leverage their innovative technologies to advance care and improve lives. A graduate from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, Courtney is driven to integrate her aspirations in medicine and healthcare with a more empathetic understanding of global health inequities. Working in the healthcare innovation space, she hopes to better understand how startup solutions are advancing care and access, especially for medically underserved communities.

Prior to MATTER, Courtney worked in global development at the United Nations and served as the co-director of the Global Engagement Summit, a social innovation conference that gathers entrepreneurs from around the world to implement effective social ventures. These experiences inspired her to continue fostering creative collaborations between diverse stakeholders to tackle today’s most pressing healthcare challenges.

Pete is a product developer currently helping maintain and improve MATTER’s website and online offering. Prior to working with MATTER, Pete helped engineer & manage software products at Helpful Human, a Seattle based digital agency. Among a variety of retail and marketing sites, he helped build a platform designed to help Seattle area doctors and their patients find healthy resources in their communities. Pete loves building simple and intuitive software that solves meaningful problems. Pete previously studied music at the University of Southern California and product development at Chicago’s Starter League.

Patrick Flavin is an entrepreneur with 20 years of experience in the life sciences field. Pat currently serves as the director of industry strategy at ContextMedia:Health, the leader in patient education at the point of care. He is also an advisor to MATTER, the Chicago healthcare technology startup center and innovation hub, where he previously served as executive director of partnerships. Prior to this role, Pat helped build several life sciences companies in the Chicago area, including MediChem Life Sciences and Advanced Life Sciences, both of which he helped take public on NASDAQ while serving as each company’s chief legal executive. As an attorney, Pat has served as counsel and advisor to several area companies in the medical device, diagnostic, health IT, and drug development space. In addition to his experiences as a chief legal executive, Pat also co-founded a venture capital fund to invest in and manage early-stage life science companies in the Midwest. Before working in the industry, he served as an assistant counsel to the Speaker of the Illinois House of Representatives.

Devin Gross has 25 years of experience as a healthcare leader. He is currently the CEO of SonarMD, a company that provides technology enabled care coordination services. Previously, Devin spent 15 years with Emmi Solutions, a leading patient engagement technology platform, serving as its CEO from 2010 through the company’s acquisition in 2017.

Prior to Emmi, he was a director with First Consulting Group and worked closely with many leading hospitals, health systems and payers. Devin began his career as a hospital administrator.

Devin received his MBA with a concentration in healthcare administration from Temple University and earned a bachelor’s degree from Lehigh University.

Johnson is the CEO and founder of 4sight Health (4sighthealth.com), a boutique advisory firm specializing in healthcare thought capital, strategic advisory services, and venture investing. He is the author of Market vs. Medicine: America’s Epic Fight for Better, Affordable Healthcare, author-in-residence at the Health Management Academy, and writer of the widely read Market Corner commentaries. Johnson is also an advisor, investor, and board member of a number of early-stage healthcare companies. During his 28-year investment-banking career, he managed over $30 billion in healthcare revenue bonds and led significant strategic advisory engagements for health system clients.

Larry is a digital health strategist and new market developer with more than 25 years of experience accelerating growth and performance for ventures at all stages of growth — from seed to scaling. He has extensive experience serving as a volunteer mentor, advisor and angel investor to Chicago-area startups at both MATTER and the Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation.

Larry is also the founder and managing partner of Ilument Group, LLC., a management consultancy focusing on strategy and business development for decision analytics, predictive science, digital health tech and population health management for early and growth stage ventures.

Maryam is passionate about moving research into the market, where it can have impact and improve lives. Her path started off at Cyberkinetics Neurotechnology Systems, Inc. where she teamed up with neuroscientists at Brown University to spin out a brain implant designed to help restore movement in paralyzed individuals. She’s also performed research herself, while pursuing her PhD in computational neuroscience at the University of Chicago. Most recently, she founded the Center for Device Development at Northwestern University, a fellowship program in medical device innovation, where doctors and engineers test drive their own medical device business ideas. Through her work, she’s come to realize the importance of building bridges between stakeholders in order to move opportunities forward. Her goal as MATTER’s vice president of programs is to actively engage with MATTER’s members to build an experience that is customized to address their individual needs.

Jeffrey Aronin has nearly 20 years of experience developing global biotech and healthcare innovation companies. His expertise in complex science and patient-focused drug development has made him one of the most successful, innovative leaders in the bioscience sector focused on addressing unmet needs for patients suffering from rare diseases. Jeffrey’s role as an entrepreneur and scientific visionary have contributed to the development and approval of nearly a dozen new medicines and technologies and created thousands of jobs.

Jeffrey currently serves as chairman and chief executive officer of Paragon Biosciences, LLC, whose mission is to improve the lives of patients suffering from debilitating diseases by building innovative biotechnology companies that bring important medicines to the market. He has served as chairman of a number of sciences companies, including Paragon Pharmaceuticals, Castle Creek Pharmaceuticals, Harmony Biosciences and Marathon Pharmaceuticals. Previously, Jeffrey served as president and chief executive officer of Ovation Pharmaceuticals Inc., a biopharmaceutical company he founded in 2000 that was acquired by Lundbeck, Inc. in 2009. Jeffrey served as president and chief executive officer of Lundbeck, Inc. during its acquisition and integration of Ovation Pharmaceuticals.

Jeffrey serves on the corporate boards of Discover Financial Services and Castle Creek Pharmaceuticals. He also the founder and co-chairman of MATTER, a biotech incubator, and he serves as a director of the Economic Club of Chicago and on the executive committee of World Business Chicago appointed by Mayor Emanuel. Jeffrey is a Crown Fellow at the Aspen Institute and a member of the Commercial Club and a regular lecturer at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and Northwestern University Kellogg School of Business.

Laura Ferris Anderson has previously served as a senior banker in J.P. Morgan’s private banking business, managing relationships and banking needs for a wide variety of clients, including corporate executives and business owners. She also served as a director of payments strategy, eCommerce and of a major image enabled transformation of check processing. She also has experience in consulting and government affairs.

An active civic leader, Laura serves on the executive committees of the board of directors of the Chicagoland Entrepreneurial Center and of the Wood Family Foundation. She serves on the board of directors of the Illinois Mentoring Partnership and the advisory board of Best Buddies Illinois as well as the Women’s boards of the Field Museum and the Joffrey Ballet.

She is a member of the Alumni Board of Governors of Georgetown University, where she earned a Bachelor of Science, a Master of Public Policy and a Master of Business Administration.

A native of Massachusetts, Laura lives in Chicago with her husband, Matt, and their daughter, Ellen.

Andrew Cittadine is the president and chief executive officer of Diagnostic Photonics, which is developing advanced imaging technology to assist physicians in the real-time evaluation of tissue microstructure.

Andrew has 15 years of leadership experience as a co-founder or chief executive in four medical device companies. He co-founded and served as CEO of medical device startup American BioOptics, served as the interim CEO for venture-backed startup SonarMed, and co-founded Sensant Corporation, a Silicon Valley-based 3D medical imaging firm that was acquired by Siemens.

Andrew received a BA in history and a BS and MS in electrical engineering from Stanford University where he was elected to Tau Beta Pi. He holds an MBA with distinction from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.

Steven Collens is CEO of MATTER, the healthcare technology incubator and innovation center. MATTER opened in February 2015 and nurtures entrepreneurs and innovators building next-generation health IT, medical device, diagnostic and biopharma technologies. MATTER works with more than 200 healthcare technology ventures and the company partners with dozens of industry-leading companies, health systems and universities. Steven is also senior advisor at Pritzker Group Venture Capital.

Prior to assuming his current role, Steven was senior vice president at Pritzker Group, the investment firm led by Tony and J.B. Pritzker. In that capacity, he led the team that created 1871, Chicago’s center for digital startups that now houses more than 400 early-stage companies. He previously worked at Abbott in a variety of domestic and international functions, including product management, policy and public affairs. In 2005, Steven helped found ConstantWellness.com to give patients control over their health data and allow healthcare providers to coordinate care of their patients. Prior to Abbott, Steven served as legislative assistant to U.S. Senator Carol Moseley-Braun.

Steven holds an MBA from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management and a BA from Washington University in St. Louis. He serves on the boards of 1871, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago and the Chicago High School for the Arts, and is a member of ChicagoNEXT, Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s council on technology and innovation. He is also a Leadership Greater Chicago fellow and a member of the Economic Club of Chicago and the Commercial Club of Chicago.

For the past two years, Steven A. Gould led Chicago Innovation Mentors (CIM), which supports university-based and local new technology innovation ventures through the use of mentor teams. MATTER acquired CIM in January 2016. Steven has extensive and broad-based experience in both clinical and scientific research in an academic environment, and executive management throughout the entire life cycle of an entrepreneurial biotechnology company.

Steven is also the founder and principal of The Gould Consulting Group LLC, which provides advisory services to companies and universities seeking to develop and capitalize on biotechnology and life science innovations, and to venture investors evaluating promising and potentially transforming companies working in areas of disruptive science. Steven was previously a scientific founder, chairman and CEO of Northfield Laboratories Inc., a publicly traded biotechnology company that was focused on developing a hemoglobin-based oxygen carrier as a blood substitute. Prior to Northfield he was chief of surgery at Michael Reese Hospital and Medical Center and professor of surgery at the University of Chicago and then the University of Illinois at Chicago.

He has dealt with the full spectrum of issues related to financing startup companies from the initial venture investment through multiple subsequent rounds, the initial public offering and follow-on offerings, and the wide range of challenges in the development of new and innovative therapies. Steven received his BA from Williams College and his MD from Boston University School of Medicine. He completed his residency training in surgery at Yale and the University of Vermont, and a research fellowship at Michael Reese and the University of Chicago.

Stephen Keith, MD, MSPH has served as the medical director of Syneos Health, a global clinical research organization, since 2018. Syneos coordinates clinical trials for pharmaceutical, biotech, and medical device companies, and also provides consulting and implementation services related to commercialization and business development. He also serves as the chief business development and medical officer for Evanston Technology Partners (ETP). As a minority business enterprise, ETP markets integrative technologies to strengthen cybersecurity, along with interface/integration, and cloud communication products and services developed by their partner companies to a range of for-profit businesses and other organizations.

From 2015 until 2018, Dr. Keith was the CEO of Vivacelle Bio, Inc., a private company that is developing a novel and proprietary intravenous fluid for correction of hypotension and hypovolemia due to fluid or blood loss. From 2012 until early 2015 Dr. Keith served as a site director for WellStreet Urgent Care in Atlanta, Georgia. Previously, he held the position of CEO of the American College of Clinical Pharmacology from 2009 to 2012. From 2006 until 2009, Dr. Keith served as president and chief operating officer of Panacea Pharmaceuticals, Inc., and from 2003 until 2006, Dr. Keith was a managing director of Glocap Advisors, an investment bank based in New York, and a senior consultant with the Biologics Consulting Group. During 2002-2003, Dr. Keith was a general partner with Emerging Technology Partners, an early-stage life sciences venture capital firm in Maryland. Just prior to joining Emerging Technology Partners, he held the position of president and chief operating officer, Antex Biologics Inc. From 1995 to 2000, Dr. Keith served as vice president of marketing and sales at North American Vaccine, Inc. From 1990 to 1995, Dr. Keith held various positions at Merck & Co., Inc., including senior director of healthcare delivery policy in corporate public affairs, senior customer manager in the U.S. human health division, and senior director of health strategies in the Merck-Medco managed care division.

Dr. Keith serves as a member of the Board of Directors of National Medical Fellowships and Community Health Charities.

Dr. Keith completed his undergraduate work at Amherst College in 1973 and received his M.D. from the University of Illinois in 1977. Dr. Keith completed a three-year residency in pediatrics at the University of California Los Angeles Center for the Health Sciences in 1980. From 1980 to 1982, he was a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Clinical Scholar at UCLA, during which time he received a master’s in science in public health from UCLA. From 1982 to 1987, Dr. Keith served on the faculty of the Charles Drew Medical School and the UCLA School of Medicine in the department of pediatrics. From 1987 to 1990, Dr. Keith served as a health policy advisor to the U.S. Senate Committee on Labor and Human Resources, under Senator Edward M. Kennedy.

Dr. Keith is a fellow of the Academy of Pediatrics and a Diplomate of the American Board of Pediatrics.

James L. Madara, MD, serves as the CEO and executive vice president of the American Medical Association (AMA), the nation’s largest physician organization. He holds the academic title of adjunct professor of pathology at Northwestern University.

Since taking the reins of the AMA in 2011, Dr. Madara has helped sculpt the organization’s visionary long-term strategic plan. As an extension of this vision, he now also serves as chairman of Health2047 Inc., an independent, design-driven innovation firm based in San Francisco whose mission is to help advance the AMA’s goal of improving the health of the nation.

Prior to arriving at the AMA, Dr. Madara spent the first 22 years of his career at Harvard Medical School, receiving both clinical and research training, serving as a tenured professor and as director of the NIH-sponsored Harvard Digestive Diseases Center. Following five years as chair of pathology at Emory, Dr. Madara served as dean of the medical school and CEO of the hospitals at the University of Chicago, bringing together the university’s biomedical research, teaching and clinical activities. While there, he oversaw the renewal of the institution’s biomedical campus and engineered significant new affiliations with community hospitals, teaching hospital systems, community clinics and national research organizations.

Dr. Madara also served as senior advisor with Leavitt Partners, an innovative healthcare consulting and private-equity firm founded by former Secretary of Health and Human Services, Mike Leavitt. Having published more than 200 original papers and chapters, Dr. Madara has received both national and international awards, and served as editor-in-chief of the American Journal of Pathology and as president of the American Board of Pathology.

In addition to Modern Healthcare consistently naming him as one of the nation’s 50 most influential physician executives, as well as one of the nation’s 100 most influential people in healthcare, he is a past recipient of a prestigious MERIT Award from the National Institutes of Health. He received the 2011 Davenport Award for lifetime achievement in gastrointestinal disease from the American Physiological Society and the 2011 Mentoring Award for lifetime achievement from the American Gastroenterological Society. Dr. Madara is an elected member of both the American Society of Clinical Investigation and the Association of American Physicians. He also co-chairs the Value Incentives and Systems Innovation Collaborative of the National Academy of Medicine (NAM), and is a member of NAM’s Leadership Consortium for Value & Science-Driven Healthcare.

Dr. Madara and his wife Vicki have 2 children, Max and Alexis.

Dr. Suzet McKinney, a nationally recognized public health expert, serves as principal and director of life sciences at Sterling Bay. In her role, Dr. McKinney leads the strategy to expand Sterling Bay’s footprint in life sciences nationwide, pursue grant programs for laboratory incubation and graduation space and advance the work of various Sterling Bay life sciences initiatives including Prysm Institute.

Prior to joining Sterling Bay, Dr. McKinney was CEO and executive director of the Illinois Medical District (IMD) where she managed medical research facilities, labs, a biotech business incubator, universities, four hospitals and more than 40 healthcare-related facilities. Before IMD, Dr. McKinney served as deputy commissioner for the Bureau of Public Health Preparedness and Emergency Response at Chicago Department of Health.

Dr. McKinney holds her doctorate degree from the University of Illinois at Chicago School of Public Health. She earned her master’s degree from Benedictine University, and her bachelor’s degree from Brandeis University. She holds faculty appointments at Harvard’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the UIC School of Public Health.

Pete McNerney has over 30 years of healthcare operating and venture capital experience. In addition to co-founding Thomas, McNerney & Partners, Pete co-founded Coral Ventures in 1992, where he was responsible for healthcare investing. Pete has served on the board of a number of the Coral Ventures’ and Thomas, McNerney and Partners’ portfolio companies. Prior to joining Coral in 1992, Pete was a co-founder and managing partner of The Kensington Group, a firm specializing in providing management services to early stage companies in the healthcare field. In 1986, he founded and served as CEO of Memtec North America, a company established to commercialize cross flow membrane microfiltration technology in North America. Previously, Pete spent 11 years with Baxter Healthcare Corporation, where he held various general management positions in the U.S., Europe, Middle East and Southeast Asia. He has served as president of the Minnesota Venture Capital Association and is on the board of trustees of Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota. A Certified Public Accountant, Pete received a B.A. from Yale and an M.B.A. from Stanford University. Pete was a 2014 fellow at Harvard’s Advanced Leadership Initiative program.

James O’Connor is the global head of venture capital for William Blair and Company. James focuses on extending the company’s advisory services among venture capital firms, corporate venture groups and entrepreneurial hubs in domestic and international markets.

James is a senior investment professional with over 20 years of private equity and venture capital experience. Prior to joining William Blair, he was a senior managing director at MVC Capital, a boutique middle market private equity firm focused on equity and debt offerings. He also held senior management positions within Motorola, Inc. Before Motorola, James worked for A.T. Kearney as a management consultant and the U.S. Treasury Department in the areas of domestic and international finance as a White House fellow. Additionally, he held roles at Ariel Capital Management, Sidley & Austin, the U.S. House Ways & Means Committee and the City of Chicago Finance Committee.

James is founding chairman of 1871 and the Chicago Entrepreneurial Center and a board member of MATTER, the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce, the Big Shoulders Fund for the Archdiocese of Chicago’s inner-city school fund and serves as a trustee and vice-chair of the board of the Field Museum of National History. He is a former board member of the Chicago Urban League, Kohl Children’s Museum and Children’s Home + Aid. He is a Henry Crown Leadership fellow of the Aspen Institute, a White House fellow, a Leadership Greater Chicago fellow, and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations Young Leadership Program. He holds a BA (Government) and JD from Georgetown University and an MBA from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management.

David Ormesher provides leadership and direction for closerlook, inc., a digital marketing agency serving the pharmaceutical industry. As founder and CEO, Ormesher has grown it into a recognized leader in creating innovative relationship marketing solutions that help pharmaceutical brands build and maintain meaningful relationships with their most valuable healthcare professionals.

Since founding the company in 1987, David has created a rich, cohesive culture at closerlook by maintaining a hands-on approach to building client success and sustaining lasting account relationships. He has guided the growth and evolution of the firm, attracting a world-class team of account, strategy, user experience, design, technology, data analytics and relationship-marketing services experts. David is a frequent speaker at marketing conferences and a recognized thought leader in the areas of interactive and relationship marketing for the pharmaceutical industry.

This past year, David was named to the board of the Lurie Children’s Hospital Foundation and to the Innovation Board of the XPRIZE Foundation. He serves on the boards of the Lyric Opera of Chicago; i.c.stars, an innovative business and leadership training program for inner city youth; and is a founder of Bigger Future, a social-enterprise building the capacity of high-potential entrepreneurs in Rwanda. He is also an adjunct professor at the Illinois Institute of Technology Stuart School of Business where he teaches customer relationship management.

Ellen Rudnick currently serves as a senior advisor on entrepreneurship and adjunct professor at Chicago Booth. She previously served as executive director of the Polsky Center and Clinical Professor of Entrepreneurship and, together with Steve Kaplan, was instrumental in the creation of the entrepreneurship programming at Chicago Booth. Prior to joining the Chicago Booth faculty, Ellen spent 25 years in business management and entrepreneurial activities, primarily in the healthcare and health information services industries. During this time, she was president and CEO of Healthcare Knowledge Resources, president of HCIA, chairman of Pacific Biometrics and corporate vice president of Baxter Healthcare Corporation.

She works with the many startups that emerge from Chicago Booth’s entrepreneurship programs. Both her governance activities and startup interests help her to bridge the gap in the classroom between the theoretical and the real world.

Ellen has been the recipient of a number of honors, including Today’s Chicago Woman 20th Anniversary Hall of Fame, the YWCA Leadership Award, the Illinois Venture Capital Richard J. Daley award and the 1871 Entrepreneurial Champion award. She serves or has served on numerous corporate boards including Liberty Mutual, First Midwest Bank, HMS Holdings, Patterson Companies, Oxford Health Plans, Northshore University Healthcare Research and Development, the Chicagoland Entrepreneurial Center,1871 and MATTER.

Ellen earned her bachelor’s degree from Vassar College and an MBA from Chicago Booth.

Kevin joined OSF HealthCare in 1978, starting out as an assistant administrator for OSF Saint Francis Medical Center located in Peoria. Over the following three decades he held a number of executive positions before being named CEO in 2011, a position he maintained until his retirement in 2017. During his tenure, OSF experienced significant growth with an emphasis on its mission of delivering exceptional healthcare and service in its markets. Kevin has a bachelor’s degree in business administration and finance from St. Louis University and earned his MBA and master’s in health administration from Xavier University.

Jeffrey R. Stewart is the executive vice president of commercial operations at AbbVie. He is responsible for leading the largest commercial area for the enterprise encompassing multiple therapeutic areas across immunology, oncology, virology, eye care, neuroscience, endo-metabolics, gastroenterology, specialty products and women’s health.

Jeffrey joined Abbott in 1992 as part of TAP, Abbott’s former U.S. joint venture with Takeda Chemical Industries. Following his time with TAP, Jeffrey held various leadership positions in Abbott’s U.S. and international pharmaceutical businesses, including divisional vice president of immunology, divisional vice president of primary care, general manager of virology and general manager for United Kingdom operations. Prior to AbbVie’s separation from Abbott in January 2013, Jeffrey served as the vice president of Abbott’s proprietary pharmaceutical division of the United States.

Jeffrey previously led the U.S. area for 10 years, including most recently as the senior vice president of U.S. commercial operations.

Jeffrey previously served on the board of the National Pharmaceutical Council and serves on the board of the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA). At AbbVie, he is the executive chair of the PRIDE employee resource group.

Jim Sullivan, Ph.D., is a venture partner with Orbimed. Prior to joining Orbimed, Dr. Sullivan was a vice president of research at Abbvie. In this role, he was responsible for AbbVie’s research efforts in a variety of therapeutic/disease areas including oncology, immunology, neurology, hepatitis C and cystic fibrosis.

Jim has advanced more than 100 compounds into clinical development across a number of disease states and technology platforms. These include recently launched combination products for HCV (Mavyret and Viekira), the-first-in- class Bcl2 selective inhibitor, Venclexta and multiple compounds currently in Phase II or III trials. He has authored/co-authored more than 130 scientific publications and is an inventor on 11 patents.

Jim is an adjunct faculty member at Northwestern University and serves on the board of a number of companies and foundations. He earned his bachelor’s degree and Ph.D. in biochemistry from Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland, and conducted post-doctoral research in neurobiology at Northwestern University.

Nancy Sullivan built Illinois Ventures’ team of top-tier investment and operations professionals and leads them in managing fundraising, investment strategy and limited partner relationships. She has deep experience in commercialization and entrepreneurship, specifically in the biotech and therapeutics industries.

A key advisor to startups, Nancy assists companies in obtaining venture capital funding, recruiting management teams and advising on business development and commercialization matters. She serves on the board of Diagnostic Photonics.

Prior to taking the helm at Illinois Ventures, Nancy served as the director of the Office of Technology Management at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and as senior director of strategic planning and business development for a biotechnology startup.

A Chicago native, Nancy is an active member of the Illinois healthcare and tech communities. She serves on the boards of iBio, a life sciences industry association that represents the 85,000 life sciences employees at member companies, universities, service providers and venture firm; Cures Within Reach, a research nonprofit that brings stakeholders together to undertake repurposing research opportunities; and MATTER a Chicago-based health tech accelerator. Nancy is also a German Marshall Fellow and participated in Leadership Greater Chicago.

Glen Tullman is the chief executive officer of Transcarent, the first comprehensive, consumer-directed health and care platform for employees of self-insured employers and their families. Born in Silicon Valley, Transcarent’s platform empowers consumers with the kind of information, guidance and access that leads to better care, better outcomes and more cost-effective decisions for everyone.

Glen is the former executive chairman, chief executive officer and founder of Livongo Health, the first at-scale consumer digital health company to truly empower people with chronic conditions to live better and healthier lives using data science.

In his final year, he led Livongo through the largest consumer digital health Initial Public Offering in history, a secondary offering, a convertible debt offering that raised over $550 million, and the industry’s largest merger to date between Livongo and Teladoc Health, valuing Livongo at $18.5 billion and beginning a new era of consumer centric virtual care.

A visionary leader and entrepreneur, Glen previously ran two other public companies that changed the way health care is delivered. During his time as chief executive officer of Allscripts, the company was the leading provider of electronic prescribing, practice management, and electronic health records. Glen led Allscripts IPO and secondary offerings. Prior to Allscripts, he was ehief Executive officer of Enterprise Systems, the leading resource management systems for hospitals, which he also took public and then sold to McKesson/HBOC. Before entering healthcare, Glen served as president and COO of CCC Information Systems, a provider of computerized systems for the property and casualty insurance sector.

Glen is also one of two founding partners at 7wireVentures, one of the highest returning venture capital funds in Illinois. He is the author of On Our Terms: Empowering the New Health Consumer, in which he proposes new solutions to address the chronic-condition epidemic facing our country.

Glen is dedicated to finding a cure for diabetes and other chronic conditions—and to keeping people healthy until cures are found. A strong proponent of philanthropy, he was honored in 2019 with a Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Ripple of Hope Award for his career focused on improving the safety, empathy and efficiency of our healthcare system. He also serves as a chancellor to the International Board of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and as a board member and the incoming chairperson of the American Diabetes Association. Glen has three amazing children that inspire him every day.

Manika Turnbull is divisional senior vice president of workforce, talent and business engagement for Health Care Service Corporation (HCSC), which is the parent company of Blue Cross and Blue Shield Plans in Illinois, Montana, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas.

In this role, Manika leads the strategy and processes related to building and retaining a high performing workforce. In her current role, Manika is focused on optimizing people-centered activities such as hiring, training, professional development, and performance management to ensure these efforts support the company’s growth and bottom line. Prior to her current role, Manika was vice president of community health and economic impact officer and was responsible for developing strategies, establishing community initiatives and directing civic investments focused on long-term solutions to improve community health and make healthcare more affordable. Prior to that, Manika was chief diversity and inclusion officer for HCSC for more than three years and is once again responsible for diversity and inclusion initiatives in her current role. Manika also has served as chief of staff for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois. Manika has been with HCSC for fourteen years.

Manika is an active member of the Chicago community. She is a member of several boards and councils, most notably the Girls Scouts of Greater Chicago and Northwest Indiana, the Blue Cross Blue Shield Institute and MATTER Chicago. She is a 2015 Leadership Greater Chicago (LGC) fellow and serves on LGC’s Board of Directors.

Manika holds a master’s degree and Ph.D. from The Chicago School of Professional Psychology, where she also serves on the Board of Trustees and received the 2016 Distinguished Alumni Award. Manika is a graduate of James Madison University, where she was team captain of JMU’s NCAA Division I women’s basketball team.

Recent accolades for Manika include: being named a 2020 DiversityMBA Top 100 Women of Influence, a Chicago United Business Leader of Color in 2019, being selected as one of 2018’s Chicago’s Top Black Women of Impact; receiving the 2017 #REDEFINEPOSSIBLE Women’s Leadership Award by the WNBA’s Chicago Sky; being named a 2017 Chicago Business Journal Woman of Influence; being named one of 2016’s Most Powerful & Influential Women in Illinois by the Illinois Diversity Council; being named a 2016 Chicago Defender Woman of Excellence; and receiving 40 Under 40 Awards from both the Congressional Black Caucus Health Braintrust and The Network Journal.

Dr. Eric E. Whitaker is physician-investor who is chairman of several companies including TWG Partners, LLC. He and his partner co-founded Symphonix Health Holdings, LLC and grew it to over 430,000 clients in 48 states over a three-year premium period. They sold Symphonix in January 2016 and investors made 15 times their money with an IRR of 280.

Until March 2012, Dr. Whitaker was the executive vice president, strategic affiliations and associate dean of community-based research at the University of Chicago Medical Center. He was also an operating advisor for Nautic Partners, a middle market private equity fund, and sat on the boards of two of its portfolio companies. He holds Series 7 and 63 licenses as well as being licensed for medicine in the State of Illinois.

Dr. Whitaker served as director of the Illinois Department of Public Health until October 2007. In this capacity, Dr. Whitaker oversaw an agency with a budget of $450 million with over 1,200 employees statewide, as well as three laboratories and seven regional offices.

In 1991, Dr. Whitaker represented the 30,000 members of the American Medical Student Association as its national president while testifying twice before the U.S. Congress regarding national health insurance and minority health issues. In November 2003, he was named as one of Crain’s Chicago Business’ Forty under Forty Chicago’s rising stars in business and government.

Dr. Whitaker received his undergraduate degree in chemistry from Grinnell College in 1987. In 1993 he received his master’s degree in public health from the Harvard School of Public Health and a medical degree from the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine. He also has completed coursework at the Northwestern Kellogg Graduate School of Management. Dr. Whitaker serves on the boards of Grinnell College, the DuSable Museum of African American History and the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. He formerly served on the boards of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Public Media and the Economic Club of Chicago.

Rob Weiss is a 2nd year JD-MBA student at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management/Pritzker School of Law.   Prior to 2020, Rob was senior product manager at Equalize Health in San Francisco, CA. At Equalize Health, he spent seven years helping create affordable, world-class medical devices for low-resource hospitals, including in the Philippines, India, Kenya and South Africa. His roles included negotiating distribution agreements, managing regulatory submissions, and leading design, manufacturing and sales teams to bring devices to market in the neonatal care and prosthetic care spaces. At Equalize Health, Rob mentored student teams and was invited to speak at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business and UCLA’s Anderson School of Management. As a law student in 2020, Rob externed with the American Medical Association in Chicago, where he supported antitrust litigation and state policy analysis.

Rob has been active in politics, serving on the national executive board of the Young Democrats of America, and volunteering on state, local and national campaigns from 2004 to 2016. He is proficient in Mandarin Chinese and plays jazz saxophone. Rob was raised in Wilmington, Delaware and graduated from Princeton University in 2009 with a degree in public policy.