The team building molecular certainty into everyday care

Fred is the President and CEO of VedaBio and a Venture Partner at OMX Ventures with extensive experience in the healthcare industry.

He currently serves as an Independent Director on several company Boards and holds an Adjunct Professor position at the University of Toronto. Prior to joining VedaBio, Fred held numerous senior leadership roles at MeMed Diagnostics, Versant Ventures, Northern Biologics (sold), bioMérieux and T2 Biosystems (IPO).

Fred received his PhD in Molecular and Medical Genetics from the University of Toronto, and his BS from McGill University.

Dr. Bashir is the Co-Founder of VedaBio and was recently elected to the National Academy of Medicine. He has held numerous roles at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, currently serving as the Dean of the Grainger College of Engineering and Grainger Distinguished Chair in Bioengineering. At Illinois he was on the founding team of the Carle Illinois College of Medicine.

An Academic Co-Founder of Prenosis, Bashir previously served as a Senior Engineering Manager at National Semiconductor, held a visiting position at Massachusetts General Hospital in the Center for Engineering and Medicine, and was on the faculty at Purdue University. He is an expert in BioMEMS and biomedical nanotechnology with countless contributions to the field, having co-authored over 300 journal papers and has been granted 55 patents.

Bashir received his PhD and his MS in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Purdue University, and his BS in Electrical Engineering from Texas Tech University.

Craig is a Managing Director with OMX Ventures. Prior to OMX, Craig managed a multi-family office where he led investments in 20+ early-stage startups in bio-tools, biotech, cyber security and specialty technology. Four of those investments are now valued at over $1B.

Craig has served as a Director or Board Observer for many transformational companies, including Twist Bioscience (NASDAQ: TWST) and Quantalife, acquired by Bio-Rad (NASDAQ:BIO). In a past life, Craig was a software product manager at 3 exited startups.

Nick is a Managing Director with OMX Ventures. Prior to OMX, Nick was the sole managing partner at Arcos Ventures, where he deployed over $80M of capital into 20+ bio-related companies. Some of Nick’s prior investments include Finch Therapeutics, Pendulum Therapeutics, Ginkgo Bioworks, 10X Genomics, Imagen, Compass Pathways and many others.

Nick also co-founded Delix Therapeutics, a startup focused on developing breakthrough therapies for psychiatric and neurological disorders.

Randy Rasmussen, Ph.D., is a distinguished leader in biotechnology, known for co-founding BioFire and serving as its President and COO. Under his leadership, BioFire grew from a handful of employees to over 3,000, becoming one of the most successful diagnostics companies globally. BioFire, now part of bioMérieux, dominates 71% of the world hospital syndromic testing market, generating over $1.3 billion annually.

As CEO of BioFire during its time as an independent subsidiary of bioMérieux, Dr. Rasmussen drove significant innovations in diagnostic technologies, enhancing patient care worldwide. He retired three years ago, leaving a legacy of excellence and growth.

On the VedaBio Board, Dr. Rasmussen brings invaluable experience and strategic insight, supporting VedaBio's mission to advance biotechnological solutions. His leadership continues to inspire the biotech community.

Valerie R. Dixon is the Chief Financial Officer of Cleveland Diagnostics, where she leads finance as the company scales commercialization of its FDA-approved IsoPSA prostate cancer test. She was most recently Senior Partner of Financing Services on the Capital Solutions and Value Realization team at Flagship Pioneering, advising portfolio companies on capital allocation strategy and capital formation.

Valerie brings 20 years of healthcare investment banking and strategic finance experience, the majority of it at Morgan Stanley, where she was Managing Director and Global Head of Life Sciences Tools and Diagnostics in the firm's Healthcare Investment Banking Group. There she advised global corporations across mergers and acquisitions, equity and debt financings, and capital markets strategy, covering the full arc of company growth from private financings and strategic partnerships to public offerings and large-scale M&A. Earlier in her career she held similar roles at J.P. Morgan, Citigroup and Lehman Brothers, including as a sell-side research analyst covering emerging medical technology, life sciences tools and diagnostics.

Valerie received her MBA from the Yale School of Management and her BA in Environmental Science and Public Policy from Harvard University. She serves on the boards of the Metropolitan Opera and the National Kidney Foundation, and is based in New York.

Swetha is a Vice President with OMX Ventures. Prior to OMX,  Swetha was an Associate at Flagship Pioneering after completing the Fellows Program in 2018. In this role, she co-founded and operated three new companies in AI/deep learning, agriculture, and cell therapy.

Before joining Flagship, she was a postdoctoral fellow at Boston Children’s Hospital / Harvard Medical School developing novel cures for hearing and balance disorders.

Dirk Heckel is Chief Technology Officer and Head of Research, Development and Innovation for the Diagnostics business of Siemens Healthineers.

Dirk brings more than 25 years in diagnostics. Before Siemens Healthineers he founded DHXcel Consulting, working with R&D teams on accelerating innovation. Earlier he was Vice President of Global Innovation at Danaher Diagnostics, where he shaped the innovation pipeline across five operating companies, and Vice President of Global Innovation at Beckman Coulter, where he managed innovation portfolios and built academic partnerships. He also serves on the Board of Directors of Babson Diagnostics.

Dirk received his MSc in Molecular Biology from Universität des Saarlandes and his PhD in Molecular Biology from the University of Tübingen.

Dr. Durocher is the Chair of VedaBio’s SAB and currently serving as Senior Investigator at the Lunenfeld-Tanenbaum Research Institute, Co-Founder and SAB member of Repare Therapeutics (NASDAQ: RPTX) and Co-Founder of Induxion Therapeutics.

A Full Professor at the University of Toronto, his work in molecular genetics has been recognized by the Paul Marks Prize for Cancer Research, the Canadian Cancer Society’s Young Investigator Prize, and Caldwell Partners Canada’s Top 40 Under 40 Award.

Durocher received his PhD in Experimental Medicine from McGill University and his BSc from Université de Montréal.

Dr. Hsu is Co-Founder of the Arc Institute and Assistant Professor of Bioengineering and Deb Faculty Fellow at the University of California, Berkeley.

Previously, he served as Principal Investigator at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies. In his time at Harvard University and the Broad institute, Hsu helped to pioneer CRISPR-Cas9 technologies for genome editing. His research group has invented multiple diagnostic and therapeutic technologies, including programmable RNA targeting and detection with CRISPR-Cas13 and multi-kilobase genome insertion with recombinases.

He has been recognized in Forbes’ 30 Under 30 and MIT Technology Review’s Innovators Under 35 lists, and received the NIH Early Independence Award, the Amgen Young Investigator Award, and the Rainwater Prize for Innovative Early Career Scientists for his research.

Hsu received his PhD in Biochemistry and Biological Engineering and his AM in Biology from Harvard University.

Dr. Perlin, a highly accomplished biomedical researcher widely recognized throughout the industry for his innovative and entrepreneurial leadership, is currently serving as Chief Scientific Officer and Executive Vice President at Hackensack Meridian Health Center for Discovery and Innovation.

Dr. Perlin and colleagues developed a number of innovative technologies used in diagnostics platforms today, which forms the core technology of many molecular detection methods including PCR. He has published more than 350 journal articles and reviews and leads two NIH national centers of excellence addressing countermeasures to high-threat pathogens.

He was named Outstanding Scientist in New Jersey by the Edward J. Ill Excellence in Medicine Awards in 2020, a Top 25 National Innovator by Modern Healthcare in 2021, a top 25 Notable Health Care Leader by Crain’s New York Business in 2022 and was awarded the 2023 Dr. Sol J. Barer Award for Vision Innovation and Leadership.

Perlin received his PhD in Plant Physiology from Cornell University.