Akiri's Board of Directors
Douglass Given, MD, PhD | Chairman of the Board
Doug is Managing Partner at Health2047 Capital Partners LLC. He served as Health2047 Inc.’s Chief Executive from its founding in August of 2015 until January 2018. Previously, Doug spent more than a decade in venture capital as an Investment Partner and General Partner at life sciences investor Bay City Capital LLC participating in five sequential life sciences general funds and two sector-specific funds; he was associated with the partnership from 1999-2015. A physician and medical scientist by background, Doug has been a global corporate and operating executive at Lilly, Monsanto, Schering Plough and Mallinckrodt and a serial entrepreneur, as well as a venture capitalist. In addition to a number of private companies, he led three public biotechnology and biopharmaceutical companies as CEO.
Doug has served on more than 20 public and private boards. He is currently a Director at Health2047 Inc., board Chair at Akiri Inc. and Arrowhead Pharmaceuticals Inc., Managing Partner at G5 Partners LLC, and serves on the board at First Mile Care Inc. and Vivaldi Biosciences Inc. He serves on advisory boards at the University of Chicago Medicine, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Stanford Medicine, Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR), and The Houston Methodist Research Institute.
Doug received MD and PhD degrees from the University of Chicago, an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, and was a Clinical and Research Fellow in internal medicine and infectious diseases at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School.
Lawrence K. Cohen, PhD | Director
Larry is CEO at Health2047 Inc. An experienced biotechnology leader, he thrives in the development of drugs and platforms to treat illnesses. Prior to joining Health2047 Inc., Larry served as Executive Vice President of Research and Business Development at Kadmon Holdings, a publicly-traded biotechnology company focused on developing therapies for immune and fibrotic diseases. His previous experiences include serving as President and CEO of San Francisco’s VIA Pharmaceuticals, where he spearheaded efforts to develop small-molecule drugs to treat cardiovascular diseases; President and CEO of Fremont-based proteomics company Zyomyx; COO of Menlo Park-based Progenitor, Inc., which developed therapies for respiratory disease and oncology; and Vice President of Research of Somatix Therapy Corporation, a pioneer in gene therapy.
He earned a PhD degree in Microbiology from the University of Illinois, and completed his postdoctoral work in Molecular Biology at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and the Department of Biochemistry at Harvard Medical School. He earned his BA from Grinnell College.