Christina Coughlin, MD, PhD is the former Chief Executive Officer of CytoImmune Therapeutics. Dr. Coughlin joined CytoImmune from Rubius Therapeutics, Inc. where she served as the Chief Medical Officer and led the clinical development, translational medicine and regulatory efforts in the allogeneic red cell therapy platform. Prior to Rubius, Dr. Coughlin was with Tmunity Therapeutics, Inc., where she served as Chief Medical Officer and was responsible for the development of autologous CAR-T and TCR-T cellular therapies.  Dr. Coughlin served as the Chief Medical Officer for Immunocore, Ltd where she led the development of KimmtrakTM, recently approved for the treatment of metastatic uveal melanoma. Dr. Coughlin has held other leadership roles in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology fields in her career including Oncology Asset Team Leader at Pfizer and Clinical Program Team Lead at Novartis. Dr. Coughlin is an oncologist and immunologist, having received her M.D. and Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania and completed fellowships in Hematology and Oncology at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and in the Translational Research Group under the direction of Carl June, M.D. at the University of Pennsylvania.

Reporting to the CEO, Karen is responsible for Operations within Avacta Therapeutics, supporting the research and development functions with the sole focus of creating maximum value for the organisation’s stakeholders. Aligning all employees to the company’s goals, Karen strategises and prioritises operational requirements, establishes achievable performance measures and sets comprehensive goals for Avacta Therapeutics’ business growth and success.

Karen has over 30 years’ experience managing complex global B2C organisations; designing, planning and implementing strategies, plans and procedures, with a focus on operational excellence, promotion of company culture/vision, and continuous improvement. Her last 15 years have seen her successfully undertake VP/SVP roles, predominantly within the healthcare and life sciences sectors.  She has grown PE backed businesses with a focus on value creation through expansion, partnerships, and acquisitions, and also has significant experience of successfully delivering business transformation and integration globally in competitive, consumer-focused environments.

Simon has over 26 years’ commercial experience in the biopharma industry. He has worked with companies from large and mid-sized pharma such as Bristol-Myers-Squibb and Menarini Group to early stage biotechs, supporting business development and licensing activities in addition to being involved in all aspects of business and corporate development. Simon has been involved in over 80 commercial deals across Europe, North America, Australasia, Japan, Russia/CIS and South America.

Simon’s career began at University of Oxford spin-out, Oxagen Limited where he established and built a franchise in Women’s Health, initially as Programme Director and later as Director of Business Development. He subsequently joined next generation sequencing company Solexa where, as Business Development Director, he was responsible for all commercial activities and external communications leading up to the reverse takeover of Nasdaq-listed Lynx Therapeutics to form Solexa Inc. which was later acquired by Illumina. Since then, Simon has worked as a consultant providing expert commercial and business development resources to a wide range of biopharmaceutical companies. Prior to moving into industry, Simon was a Wellcome Trust Research Fellow at the University of Oxford and an Honorary Clinical Lecturer at Imperial College London. He has published widely, particularly in the field of complex disease genetics.

Dr Morrow is an established scientific leader with over 17 years’ experience in oncology research in the biotech and pharma industry. She was most recently Senior Vice President, Head of invoX Therapeutic Innovation, leading a discovery and preclinical research team that was established following the acquisition of F-star by invoX, where she held the position of SVP, Head of Research.  During her time at F-star, Dr Morrow made significant contributions to progressing bispecific candidates from discovery and into clinical trials and led F-star’s biology and translational research functions through the transition from private biotech to NASDAQ listing. Prior to this, she established an immuno-oncology preclinical modelling group supporting projects across the Medimmune and AstraZeneca portfolio and held Discovery Project Leader roles for Imfinzi^® and volrustomig.

Dr Morrow earned her PhD in Immunology from the University of Cambridge and performed post-doctoral research into childhood Leukaemia at the Institute of Child Health, London.

Shaun Chilton was most recently Chief Executive Officer (“CEO”) of the formerly London-listed Clinigen Group plc (“Clinigen”), a global pharmaceutical and pharmaceutical services platform business, which he led through a significant growth journey. During his tenure, the company expanded through both an organic and a buy-and-build strategy which included successfully completing several transformational acquisitions. The Company was eventually sold to Triton Partners for a total consideration of c.£1.3 billion in April 2022.

Alongside his role as the CEO of Clinigen, Shaun was Non-Executive Chairman of C7Health, a disruptive, venture capital-backed medical technology and services business which executed an acquisitive growth journey before successfully being acquired by a strategic buyer in 2022.

Shaun has held a number of senior and executive commercial positions over more than 30 years in companies in pharmaceutical and pharmaceutical services industries. These include at Pfizer, Sanofi, Wolters Kluwer Health and KnowledgePoint360 Group (now part of UDG Healthcare).

Mark A. Goldberg, MD, is a medical oncologist and hematologist and a biotechnology executive.  In addition to being a Non-executive Director of Avacta, he currently serves on the boards of directors of Idera Pharmaceuticals, GlycoMimetics, Blueprint Medicines, and Walden Biosciences. Dr. Goldberg was part of the executive management team of Synageva Biopharma from 2011 until 2014.  Prior to that, he served in various management capacities of increasing responsibility at Genzyme Corporation from 1996 until 2011, including as senior vice president of Clinical Development.  Prior to joining Genzyme, Dr. Goldberg was a full-time staff physician at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, where he still holds an appointment. He is an associate professor of Medicine (part-time) at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Goldberg is also a longtime American Cancer Society (ACS) and ACS Cancer Action Network volunteer. Dr. Goldberg was a member of the American Cancer Society New England Division Board from 2010-2017.  He has been a member of the national Board of Directors of the American Cancer Society since 2019.  He received his AB from Harvard College (magna cum laude) and his MD (cum laude) from Harvard Medical School (Harvard MIT Program in Health Sciences and Technology).

Ms. Deptula-Hicks is the interim CFO at Normunity, and prior to that served as CFO of F-star Therapeutics (NASDAQ:FSTX), which she took public in 2020 and successfully sold in 2023. Previously, she held the role of CFO at Northern Biologics and T2 Biosystems (NASDAQ:TTOO). She also served as SVP and CFO of Pieris Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:PIRS) which she also took public. Ms. Deptula-Hicks currently sits on the Board of Directors of Abcuro and Aerami Therapeutics, providing strategic financial and business direction.  Ms. Deptula-Hicks received her M.B.A. from Rivier University and B.S. in Accounting from Southern New Hampshire University. 

Dr. Ho is a translational clinical researcher on the Head and Neck Medical Oncology service and Cell Therapy Service at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK). His research focus is the discovery of novel therapeutics for cancers of the head and neck. He has built translational research programs in head and neck squamous cell carcinomas, thyroid cancers and salivary gland cancers. Dr. Ho has taken on national and international positions of leadership to promote the development of translational trial concepts in the head and neck field, including as co-lead of the Head and Neck Working Group in the Experimental Therapeutics and Rare Tumor Committee of the Alliance cooperative group, board member for the International Thyroid Oncology Group, chair of the head and neck subsection of the International Clinical Trials in Rare Cancers Initiative, and member of the NCI Head and Neck Steering Committee.

Dr. Andrea Napolitano works as a Consultant Medical Oncologist in the Sarcoma Unit of the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust. He graduated as an MD in 2011 (University Campus Bio-Medico, Rome, Italy) and he then obtained a PhD in Molecular Biosciences and Bioengineering in 2015 (University of Hawai’i at Mānoa, Honolulu, USA). Dr. Napolitano completed his residency in Medical Oncology in 2021 (University Campus Bio-Medico, Rome, Italy).

He is heavily involved in translational and clinical research in soft tissue sarcoma, GIST and desmoid fibromatosis. He has been sub-investigator and principal investigators in phase I-II-III clinical trials and has co-authored more than 70 peer-reviewed articles.

Dr. Yu is a clinical cardiologist specializing in the comprehensive management of co-existing cardiovascular disease and cancer as well as the cardio-toxic side effects of chemotherapy treatment. Through close collaboration with the cancer treatment team, his goal is to ensure the best outcomes for patients with cancer who are at risk for or who have concurrent cardiovascular disease.

Dr. Yu works closely with oncologists to monitor patient’s cardiovascular health during treatment and provide long-term follow-up cardiac care for cancer survivors. He also provides cardiac evaluation for patients with cancer who are scheduled to undergo major surgery or to receive potentially cardio-toxic cancer treatment.

Dr. Lee Cranmer is the Curt and Elizabeth Anderson Endowed Professor in Sarcoma Research at the University of Washington and Professor in the Clinical Research Division at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center in Seattle, Washington, USA.  He is dedicated to improving the care of patients with these conditions through the translation of translating lab findings into new clinical advances. He designs and leads clinical trials of new therapies for these cancers, including novel cytotoxic agents, targeted drugs and immunotherapies, from phase 1 studies to national cooperative-group trials. He also is interested in analysis of large data sets to answer key clinical questions. As director of the Bob and Eileen Gilman Family Sarcoma Clinic and Sarcoma Clinical Research Program, Dr. Cranmer is responsible for nurturing sarcoma-related research, teaching and outreach within the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center/University of Washington consortium.

Professor Jones is a medical oncologist specialising in the treatment of bone and soft tissue sarcomas and Head of the Sarcoma Unit at The Royal Marsden.

He has experience in conducting Phase I, II and III trials, as well translational studies in sarcomas. Professor Jones trained in medical oncology at The Royal Marsden and between 2010 and 2014 he was Head of the Sarcoma Program at the University of Washington/Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle.

His main research interest focuses on clinical trials and translational research in sarcomas.

Dr Metcalf is a Medical Oncologist and Clinician Scientist studying Head and Neck Cancers with an academic focus on Salivary Gland Cancers. Dr Metcalf was awarded his Medical Degree at the University of Manchester in 2004, and began Medical Oncology Specialist Training in 2007 which was completed in 2015. He was awarded his PhD in 2016 at having studied in the Clinical and Experimental Pharmacology Lab under Prof Caroline Dive at the CRUK Manchester Institute, developing novel pre-clinical models of lung cancer.

Following his PhD, Dr Metcalf has undertaken post-doctoral research in tumour-immunology in Head and Neck cancers based in the Manchester Collaborative Centre for Inflammation Research with Prof Tracy Hussell. He is the UK lead for the International Rare Cancers Initiative Salivary Gland Cancer Group and is setting up a research lab focusing on understanding the biology of salivary gland cancers to develop new therapies.

William D. Tap, MD is the Chief of the Sarcoma Medical Oncology Service at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York. He is a medical oncologist who specializes in the treatment of patients with soft tissue and bone sarcomas. Bill has extensive experience in translational medicine as it applies to oncology and early drug development. He is an expert in developing therapeutic strategies in rare diseases and neoplasms, incorporating basic science research, correlative science, clinical medicine, and health outcomes tools. Bill’s academic research interests are focused on understanding the genetic and molecular nuances of sarcoma with an emphasis on identifying and validating therapeutic targets, treatment biomarkers, and modeling drug resistance. He is also focused on understanding cellular gerocoversion and its application to clinical medicine. Bill received his Medical Degree from Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia and performed his residency in Internal Medicine at the Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, and his fellowship in Hematology and Medical Oncology at the UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles.