Meet our team
Albert Montano
General Partner
Mr. Montano’s extensive experience has enabled him to secure growth capital for emerging companies and to place considerable funds into private equity opportunities. He specializes in patents, copyrights, and trademarks of intellectual property, as well as resource acquisition. Additionally, Mr. Montano has extensive experience in concept development of emerging technologies.
Mr. Montano holds a Master’s in Business Administration (MBA) from Harvard University where he held a fellowship from the Robert Sterling Clark Foundation and received a scholarship from the Council on Graduate Management Education. He also is a member of the Harvard Club of New York City. He completed his undergraduate studies at the University of New Mexico receiving a Bachelor of Science in Pharmacy.
Mr. Montano serves on the board of directors of Maxx Media Group LLC, and on the advisory board of Alternative Investment Resource, a wholesale brokerage firm, as Managing Director, Institutional Relations for the EMCO/Hanover Group and as Managing Director of Alternative Funds Advisors, Inc. He is a principal in Wall Street Capital Fund in New York City and a Senior Associate with Breuer Partners, an illustrious global consulting firm to the healthcare industry.
Mr. Montano is a recognized civic and business leader with integrity and vision. He enjoys being involved in the development of innovation that helps define breakthrough technologies. His impact on applied research may prove to be his greatest achievement. His creative talents and entrepreneurial business acumen complement his high energy and optimism.
Jon Weston
General Partner
Mr. Weston has 36 years of experience in bio-pharmaceuticals, medical device and agricultural biotechnology. His career has spanned a breadth of activities included clinical development, regulatory processes, product commercialization, business strategy, tactical implementation, marketing and sales.
Mr. Weston received his B.A. in Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology from the University of Colorado, Boulder, and an M.B.A. from the University of Denver.
He was founding President and CEO of PhotonPharma, a biotechnology company developing an immune therapy for cancer, now in clinical development. He formerly served as CEO of BioCare Systems, developer of the first professional near infrared light therapy device cleared for consumer use. As Chief Commercialization Officer at Navigant Biotech, he led development and commercialization of the Mirasol pathogen inactivation technology for blood components, which has eliminated transfusion transmitted disease in 34 countries. He served as Director at Gambro BCT (now Terumo) resulting in capture of majority market share of apheresis equipment.
Mr. Weston began his career at G.D. Searle Pharmaceuticals (now Pfizer), serving in a progression of roles from sales to Director in the Arthritis Franchise, leading the worldwide launch of Arthrotec,® a $600 million drug. He was a key contributor in development and commercialization of the $3 billion blockbuster arthritis drug Celebrex®.
Mr. Weston is a member of the Social and Advisory Group for Entrepreneurs (SAGE), providing start-ups with advisory and mentoring assistance. He also provides advice and consulting to the Fitzsimons Redevelopment Authority Bioscience Incubator for early-stage bioscience companies.
Meet our Advisory Board
Gary Gordon, MD
Gary B. Gordon, M.D., Ph.D., is an accomplished pharmaceutical executive and strategic business leader with extensive experience in the development of drugs from first in-human studies to approval and commercialization. He brings innovative approaches to the process, leveraging advantageous regulatory pathways and close collaborations with investigators, patient advocacy groups and key academic and government consortiums.
Recently, Dr. Gordon served as the Vice President, Oncology Department at AbbVie (a spin-off of Abbott), where he oversaw the development of AbbVie’s oncology projects. He drove drug development innovations and advanced the Oncology pipeline. He played a critical role in the oncology business expansion, leading to Abbvie’s current position in Oncology. This includes the approval of venetoclax, several major acquisitions and other collaborations. Gary was on the Abbvie-Genentech team that received the 2017 Prix Galien award for the Best Pharmaceutical Product.
Prior to AbbVie, Gary was Chief Scientific Officer and Vice President of Clinical Affairs at Ovation Pharmaceuticals from 2001 to 2003. In this role, he helped obtain funding and five on market products.
He entered the pharmaceutical industry at G.D. Searle, which eventually became part of Pfizer. His responsibilities included programs related to COX-2 inhibitors for the prevention and treatment of cancer and cancer immunization programs. He also co-chaired an AACR task force focused on the treatment and prevention of intraepithelial neoplasias.
Gary holds a BS in Biochemistry from Stony Brook University and earned an MD and PhD at Johns Hopkins.
Paul Young, PhD
Paul Young, PhD, is a leader, innovator, and pipeline builder with more than 25 years of experience in the biopharmaceutical industry. He has a unique career mix of science, strategy, and business development that has successfully delivered numerous internal R&D programs for clinical development as well as transformational licensing deals with external parties. Paul has deep experience and success both at small biotech startups as well as global pharmaceutical companies.
Paul is founder and CEO of Nutmeg, a company taking a new approach to building a pharma company that connects to the patient, patient family and patient community. He previously served as Chief Business Officer at Immunai and Fortress Biotech.
Prior to that he served at Merck Research Laboratories as a member of the Business Development & Licensing team at the Boston Innovation Hub. He was focused on search and evaluation of new, external pipeline opportunities for oncology and immuno-oncology, both as single agents as well as in combination with approved cancer therapies such as pembrolizumab.
Previous positions include Head of Technologies, External Science & Innovation, Pfizer; Global Head, External Innovation, EMD Serono; CSO, Syndexa Pharmaceuticals; Head of Operations, Oncology Discovery and Science Site Head, Sanofi; VP of Research, Avalon Pharmaceuticals; Research Scientist and Project Leader, Human Genome Sciences.
Paul received his BS in Biology from Yale University; PhD in Cellular, Molecular, & Developmental Biology from Harvard University, and completed his postdoctoral fellowship at Genentech in Immunology & Molecular Oncology.
Chris Min, MD, PhD
Chris Min is an MD/PhD physician-scientist, board-certified in neurology having trained at the Columbia Univ. Med. Ctr. Neurological Institute, with emphasis in Movement Disorders. He also served on faculty in the Neurology Department, as attending physician, while also conducting research in X-ray crystallography.
He most recently led early clinical development at Cerevel Therapeutics, a neuroscience-focused biotech where he investigated targets helpful in unmet psychiatric and neurologic diseases. He managed Phase 1 studies needed for the leading to late stage trials for tavapadon, a novel therapy for Parkinson's Disease. Cerevel was recently acquired by AbbVie.
Prior to this He served as Interim Chief Executive Officer and Chief Medical officer at Longeveron, a clinical-stage biotechnology company developing cellular therapies for aging-related and life-threatening conditions. He also served as Senior Medical Director in Neurology at BlueRock therapeutics, applying cell-based regenerative therapies for degenerative diseases in cardiology, immunology and neurology.
Chris entered the pharmaceutical industry focusing on early clinical development at Merck, advising discovery teams on translating work from lab to the clinic, and running a Phase 1 study that led to the successful registration of Bridion, a novel selective relaxing binding agent. He has extensive experience interacting with the FDA, successfully filing multiple INDs and NDAs, and managing an extended negotiation with the OSI.
Chris holds a degree in Biochemical Sciences from Harvard University, an MD from Cornell University and a PhD in Biochemistry from The Rockefeller University.