Devices & Diagnostics, Health IT, Pharma, Startups

Women to watch: MedCity News’s nominees for 40 women over 40

One of the first things I learned in my conversations with industry insiders after joining […]

One of the first things I learned in my conversations with industry insiders after joining MedCity News was this: while you might find a lot of young people starting health IT companies, most life science entrepreneurs tend to be an older set, putting the years of experience they have acquired from careers spent rising through the ranks of pharmaceutical companies to good use.

Whitney Johnson’s post Get Innovation Right underscores that need for experience and insight to make a company work. And even though there are plenty of technology companies launched by young people, the ones that stand to make a difference longterm are those that are led or guided by practiced hands. Citing research from the Kauffman Foundation, the highest rate of entrepreneurship in America has shifted to the 55–64 age group, with people over 55 almost twice as likely to found successful companies than those between 20 and 34.”

She adds that developmental psychologist Erik Erikson referred to the period after 40 as something of a golden age for human achievement:

“…where our wealth of knowledge and know-how can move innovation into overdrive. It is a time where we are supremely motivated to do not just for ourselves, but for others, as we ask the question, What can I do to make my life really count?”

She and Christina Vuleta are creating a list of 40 Women to Watch Over 40 (@40over40). In light of their effort to seek recommendations for 40 women over 40, here are some suggestions from MedCity News for women entrepreneurs with a lot of know how and initiative that have launched some innovative companies in healthcare and life sciences.

Dr. Susan Catalano

Cognition Therapeutics Chief Science Officer and Co-founder 

Catalano has more than 14 years of scientific leadership experience in the pharmaceutical industry spanning neurobiology and oncology. She had eight years of Alzheimer’s disease drug discovery research before launching Cognition’s platform to develop treatments for Alzheimer’s disease and other neurodegenerative disorders. Before she founded Cognition, she worked as as director of discovery biology for South San Francisco-based Acumen Pharmaceuticals where she led the scientific team.

Dr. Michelle Dipp

OvaScience co-founder and CEO

Dipp has worked both on the investor and entrepreneur sides of startups. Dipp heads up the fertility treatment group that’s based on infertility research by Jonathan Tilly at Massachusetts General Hospital. Its lead program isolates a certain egg-producing stem cell found in the ovary and extracts the cells’ mitochondria. As the number and function of mitochondria decrease with age, OvaScience’s idea is that it can revitalize eggs and improve their quality by injecting those extracted mitochondria into an egg during in vitro fertilization. Dipp is also a founder and partner of Longwood Fund, which founds and invests in healthcare companies such as Alnara (acquired by Eli Lilly) and Verastem. Dipp previously was the senior vice president and head of the Center of Excellence for External Drug Discovery at GlaxoSmithKline.

Dr. Yin Ho

Context Matters founder and CEO

Ho started her career in the pharmaceutical industry, working for Pfizer for several years before starting her own health IT business that uses a cloud-based, risk-management tool to provide a global picture of each country’s reimbursement agency decisions for drugs treating more than 35 conditions. It is designed to help drug developers ascertain development risk — the kind of need that a pharmaceutical insider would ascertain. She also co-founded New York City Health Business Leaders in 2009 to rally together healthcare business leaders, attract new healthcare businesses to the city and engage New York residents in healthcare discussions.  She graduated from Brown in 1992, got her MD degree from Yale in 1996 and got an MBA from Harvard Business School in 2000. She worked for Pfizer for nine years, most recently as senior director for medical policy.

Christy Shaffer, PhD

Hatteras Discovery managing director

Shaffer is a receptor pharmacologist. She was the first full-time employe at Inspire Pharmaceuticals in 1995. She raised more than $300 million for the company and took it public in 2000. Now she is managing director of Hatteras Discovery and the board chair of two Hatteras portfolio companies: G1 Therapeutics and Clearside Biomedical. She also donates her time to entrepreneurial efforts at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill campus, to many biotech groups, and non-profit boards.

Jeanette Hill, PhD
Spot on Sciences Founder and CEO
Hill is another scientist running a startup in Austin. She has a PhD in bioorganic chemistry. She founded Spot On Sciences in 2010 after working in the pharmaceutical industry in drug development and metabolism. She went to Deauville, France, as a finalist in the 2011 Cartier Women’s Initiative Award, an annual international business plan competition for women entrepreneurs.

Sunnie Southern
Viable Synergies and Innov8 for Health Founder and CEO
Southern is one of those connectors that knows everyone and is always willing to help anyone. She is the CEO of Viable Synergy in Cincinnati, is an affiliate member of the Health Data Consortium, and is the founder of Innov8 for Health, an accelerator that supports healthcare startups. She worked in the pharma industry before starting her consulting business. She understands the challenges of launching new products, of changing the system and of supporting entrepreneurs.

Anne DeGheest

MedStars managing partner and co-founder of HealthTech Capital

DeGheest was part of the founding executive team of Nellcor (a division of Covidien), MedPool and OmniCell (Nasdaq: OMCL). She helped grow new entrepreneurial divisions of large corporations like Johnson & Johnson, Baxter, Medtronic and McKesson. Additionally, DeGheest provided angel capital, hands-on operating expertise and/or business strategy in the founding of companies such as Pyxis (CareFusion), Aspect Medical (acquired by Covidien), VISX (acquired by AMO), Thermage (merged into Solta Medical), VISICU(acquired by Philips) and Masimo (Nasdaq: MASI).

[Photo Credit: Bigstock Photos]

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