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Sunil Shah

CEO - o2h Ventures and Co-founder - o2h discovery

Sunil's Biography

Sunil Shah

CEO - o2h Ventures and Co-founder - o2h discovery

A serial entrepreneur having begun a career in the Life Sciences team at PA Consulting group followed by co-founding two companies in the information technology and life sciences sector. The second of these companies, Oxygen Healthcare Ltd was acquired by Piramal Enterprises Ltd (BSE: PEL). Sunil co-founded o2h ventures which involves discovery services / collaborations, seeding drug discovery, academic in-licensing and biotechnology incubation. Sunil has a degree in Biochemistry and an MBA from Cambridge University

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Prashant Shah

CEO - o2h co-work labs and co-founder - o2h group

Prashant's Biography

Prashant Shah

CEO - o2h co-work labs and co-founder - o2h group

A serial entrepreneur having begun a career with the Strategy group of at Accenture followed by co-founding two companies in the technology and life sciences sector. The second of these companies focused on drug discovery was acquired by a public company. Prashant co-founded o2h Ventures which is involved in seeding, incubating and investing in early stage life science and technology companies. Prashant has a BEng, MSc and an MPhil in Management.

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Andy Morley

Chief Scientific Officer

Andy's Biography

Andy Morley

Chief Scientific Officer

Creative and innovative medicinal chemist with extensive knowledge and expertise. Twenty five years experience working in
the pharmaceutical industry.

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David Davies

Head of Medicinal Chemistry

David Davies

Head of Medicinal Chemistry

David Davies has 25 years of experience in medicinal chemistry within the pharmaceutical industry with a focus on the antibacterial area (clavulanates, penicillinates, pseudomonates and bacterial topoisomerase inhibitors). He previously worked at GSK and currently holds a part-time academic position at University College London (UCL). He served as the Head of Medicinal Chemistry at Antabio for nearly a decade, specialising in antibacterial research, and has extensive experience managing chemistry projects in multiple countries including France, UK, India and China. He is the inventor of 40 patents and has authored 37 publications.

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Nilesh Dagia

Chief Special Projects Officer

Nilesh's Biography

Nilesh Dagia

Chief Special Projects Officer

Nilesh leads the global operations of o2h group covering a wide range of innovation led investment, life-science and technology businesses. He is also overseeing the development and execution of the new o2h discovery Shirish Research Centre in Ahmedabad, India. Prior to joining o2h group, Nilesh worked with Piramal Group in various capacities including as an Alliance Manager for a risk-share oncology-based collaboration with a US Big Pharma and has also worked as the Head of Biology in Piramal Discovery solutions. Nilesh obtained his Ph.D. from Ohio University and completed a post-doc in Immunology, Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine at Harvard Medical School. He is the author and inventor of >30 life science patents and publications. He received the Young Scientist of India award from OPPI in 2010.

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Claudio Dagostin

Vice President - Business Development, o2h Discovery

Claudio's Biography

Claudio Dagostin

Vice President - Business Development, o2h Discovery

Claudio got his PhD in Chemistry (Mechanisms of Organic Reactions) from the University in 2000. He went for a post-doc at Imperial College London where he worked on Alzheimer's disease chemical probes. In 2004, he started working in several companies in the Cambridge biotech cluster where he deepened his knowledge in Medicinal Chemistry and in Fragment Based Drug Design. In 2012 he went back to academia at Cambridge University where he investigated challenging drug targets such as protein-protein interactions. He also co-founded the Entrepreneurial Postdocs of Cambridge (EPOC) society in 2015 to support postdocs in their pursuit of entrepreneurial careers. In 2017 joined Capital Cell and then Abzena in Cambridge with a role in Business Development.

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Dr. Catherine Stace

Vice President - Business Development (East Coast USA) & Strategic Relationship

Dr. Catherine Stace

Vice President - Business Development (East Coast USA) & Strategic Relationship

Dr. Catherine holds over 18 years of post-doctoral experience in therapeutic discovery, with strategic roles in biotechnology, consultancy, and CRO organizations. She has contributed to small molecule therapeutics, peptides, health tech, and engineering. She started her career at Isogenica and Bicycle Therapeutics, establishing therapeutic platforms and discovery programs. She has also consulted for various biotech and health tech start-ups to develop platform technologies at the intersection of biology and engineering. Before joining o2h, she was EVP of Business Development at Domainex, collaborating with companies in the UK, USA, and Europe.

She has completed an MSc in Biochemistry from Nottingham, a PhD in Cell Biology from Cambridge, and an MBA from the Open University.

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Tejas Upadhyay

Vice President - Business Development (USA), o2h Discovery

Tejas's Biography

Tejas Upadhyay

Vice President - Business Development (USA), o2h Discovery

A chemist with a passion for drug discovery and programme management. >17 years of experience working with various contract research organisation like Alembic, Evotec, o2h discovery and Piramal. Gained PhD from India and post-doctoral experience from Glasgow University, UK.

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Gayathri Sadasivam

Vice President - Biology

Gayathri's Biography

Gayathri Sadasivam

Vice President - Biology

Gayathri leads the biology capabilities in Ahmedabad, India and Cambridge, UK. She also significantly contributes to the business development with the o2h customers world-wide, understanding the market requirements, contributing to technology transfer and investment evaluations. Prior to this, she has worked for >15 years in different therapeutic areas in both industry and academia. She has led multiple programs in drug discovery projects through lead optimization to candidate selection and further development to late stage clinical trials. She has worked in a multi-disciplinary environment, leading chemical biology efforts creating chemical tools that modulate novel class of “undruggable” targets. Gayathri has a Ph.D. in Neuroscience from the Brain Research Institute, Zurich, Switzerland.

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Hemal Soni

Vice President - Chemistry

Hemal's Biography

Hemal Soni

Vice President - Chemistry

Comprehensive experience in Leading & Guiding Multi-FTE “Synthetic Chemistry Research” Collaborations which are in support
to fast paced Medicinal Chemistry Projects – for overseas collaborators.

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Dharmesh Bhatt

Head - Business Development (India)

Dharmesh's Biography

Dharmesh Bhatt

Head - Business Development (India)

Dharmesh obtained his Master’s degree in Chemistry from M.K University and has done MBA in industrial Management from National Institute of Management. He has about 27 years of industrial experience during which he has served many MNCs like Zydus Cadila, Piramal, Dishman Pharma, Daicel etc. He has immense expertise in the purification, isolation & characterization of heterocyclic, macrocyclic, natural products, etc. Dharmesh was also in role of Sales & BD for analytical services, pharma impurity standard, separation services & column business for domestic market.

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Dr. Andy Richards

Advisory Board Member

Dr. Andy Richards

Advisory Board Member

Andy Richards is an entrepreneur and investor known for founding and scaling innovative Biotech and Healthtech companies in the UK. He chairs Arecor, Congenica, Abcodia, and Babraham Bioscience Technologies Ltd, and is a director of Ieso Digital Health, Silence Therapeutics plc, Cancer Research Technology, and Sensiia. He advises several investment funds, including Cambridge Innovation Capital and the UCL Technology Fund. Andy, a Cambridge graduate with a PhD in Chemistry, has held positions at ICI (now AstraZeneca) and PA Technology. He has founded and invested in over 25 ventures and received a CBE for services to life-science investment in 2015.

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Dr. Rashmi Barbhaiya

Advisory Board Member

Dr. Rashmi Barbhaiya

Advisory Board Member

Dr. Rashmi Barbhaiya is a seasoned pharmaceutical executive with over 30 years of experience in R&D, encompassing two decades in large pharma and a decade as an entrepreneur. He co-founded and led Advinus Therapeutics and is now advancing a globally networked innovation model to address Pharma R&D challenges. Dr. Barbhaiya holds a Ph.D. in Clinical Pharmacology from the University of London and completed post-doctoral training in the US. He has authored over 150 publications and received numerous awards, including being named an AAPS Fellow and BioSpectrum Entrepreneur of the Year in 2010.

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Bhargavi Jansari

Senior Manager - Operations

Bhargavi's Biography

Bhargavi Jansari

Senior Manager - Operations

A passionate HR professional with rich experience in the areas of Performance Management,Talent Hiring & Management,
Learning & Development, Payroll Management, Employee Engagement, Employee Relations, HR Process
Automation & HR operations.

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Neetusingh Sengar

Manager - Human Resource

Neetu's Biography

Neetusingh Sengar

Manager - Human Resource

Neetu is a passionate HR professional with over six years of experience. She has been an integral part of the HR team at the o2h group for a few years now, and she has contributed exceptionally in various HR functions ranging from talent acquisition to resource planning and forecasting. 

Neetu holds a postgraduate degree in Electronics and Communication from Sardar Patel University and a postgraduate diploma in HRM from Mahatma Gandhi Labour Institute. On days when she is not scouting talent for o2h group, you will find her experimenting in the kitchen, enjoying music and reading books.

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Pragnesh Thakkar

Head - Finance & SCM

Pragnesh's Biography

Pragnesh Thakkar

Head - Finance & SCM

Mr. Pragnesh Thakkar serves as the Finance Manager of o2h Group for 13+ years. He also heads Accounting, Financials, Secretarial functions of the company. Well versed in Accounting, Financial reporting, MIS and Taxation. He has a degree of Master in Commerce and has total 15 year of industrial work experience.

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Tammy Ward

Head of Design

Tammy's Biography

Tammy Ward

Head of Design

Tammy is a senior digital creative having 16+ years of experience in designing. She has a passion for producing engaging
and effective user experiences and bringing digital marketing campaigns to life.

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Ajit Singh Guller

Head - Marketing

Ajit's Biography

Ajit Singh Guller

Head - Marketing

As the Head of Marketing at the o2h group, Ajit assumes a leadership role, overseeing a team of talented marketing and BD ops professionals dedicated to enhancing the company's brand presence. Ajit's responsibilities encompass brand marketing, advertising and research, content and digital marketing, business analytics, as well as public relations and communications.

Before joining the o2h group, Ajit worked with two SME tech companies serving global clients, and a seed stage e-commerce startup. He brings a wealth of experience to the table, with a keen focus on design, user experience, behavior analysis, and digital analytics.

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