Georgia Bio each year recognizes individuals, companies and
organizations for significant contributions to Georgia’s life sciences
industry with its Georgia Bio Community Awards. The recipients will be
honored at the Annual Awards Dinner January 23, 6 pm to 9 pm, at
Atlanta’s Fox Theater. Register
Here
The 2014 recipients are Richard diMonda, BEE, MSBME, MBA; Judy
M. Gantt, M.Ed., Director, David J. Sencer CDC Museum, Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention; Joseph M. Patti, Ph.D., Executive
Vice President, Corporate Development & Strategy, Biota Pharmaceuticals,
Inc.; and Todd Sherer, PhD, CLP, Associate Vice President for
Research Administration and Executive Director of Technology Transfer,
Emory University.
Richard diMonda, BEE, MSBME, MBA was trained in electrical and
biomedical engineering, and in business. He brings many years of medical
device commercialization experience, from a variety of public and
private medical companies, to new medical device and Health IT ventures.
He has executive management as well as hands-on experience with
regulatory (FDA PMA and 510k clearance), clinical research, product
management and marketing. Having managed 5 PMA clinical trials and
registries encompassing over 3,000 patients and 60 US and European
sites, and worked in over 18 different fields of medicine he specializes
in entrepreneurial start-ups. He’s applied this knowledge to help
companies refine their value proposition, product and clinical focus so
that it is in alignment with new health care policy initiatives for
proof of cost benefit and clinical utility, positioning a company to
secure third party reimbursement. Currently he is working with a number
of Georgia Research Alliance startups, with an emphasis on helping
medical startups reach commercially oriented milestones to open
investment opportunities to them from a variety of governmental,
foundation, and private equity sources.
Judy M. Gantt, M.Ed. has served as Director, David J. Sencer CDC
Museum since its inception as the Global Health Odyssey Museum. She
manages all projects, including educational programming for students and
teachers, such as the CDC Disease Detective Camps and Teach
Epidemiology; temporary, permanent, and traveling exhibitions; and
the CDC history collections.
Ms. Gantt joined CDC as an instructional specialist in 1980. She went on
to direct CDC’s continuing education courses and public health image
library, and to spearhead CDC’s first distance learning broadcasts. She
managed immunization training courses and curriculum projects for
physicians, nurses, and other public health personnel for eight years,
and was recruited to serve as director of the new CDC Museum in 1996.
After the events of September and October, 2001, she directed the public
health response hotline, designed to answer public inquiries on
bioterrorism and other public health topics. Ms. Gantt has served on
Georgia Bio’s Education and Workforce Development committee since 2007,
and is a member of the Board of Advisors, Georgia BioEd Institute.
Joseph M. Patti, M.S.P.H., Ph.D. is currently the Executive
Vice-President, Corporate Development & Strategy at Biota
Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a publicly traded biopharmaceutical company
focused on the development of novel drugs to treat life-threatening
viral respiratory infections. Dr. Patti is also a founding Board Member
of SciStem Therapeutics LLC, a private company developing
“first-in-field” regenerative medicine cell-based therapies for bone
healing and other orthopedic and musculoskeletal disorders. Dr. Patti
was a co-founder of Inhibitex, Inc., a NASDAQ-listed biopharmaceutical
company developing novel therapeutics for a variety of bacterial and
viral infections. Inhibitex was acquired by Bristol Myers Squibb for
$2.5B in February 2012. Prior to the acquisition, Dr. Patti was
Inhibitex’s Chief Scientific Officer as well as the Senior Vice
President, Research & Development. Under Dr. Patti’s direction, the
company successfully filed five Investigational New Drug Applications
(three biologicals, two small molecules) with the FDA. During Dr.
Patti’s tenure the company executed an initial public offering and
raised over $300M in private and public equity. Prior to founding
Inhibitex, Dr. Patti was a Research Assistant Professor at Texas A&M’s
Institute of Biosciences and Technology and was focused on the molecular
aspects of bacterial - host interactions. From 1996 to 1998, he also
served on the faculty at the University Of Texas Health Science Center
Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences.
Todd Sherer, PhD, CLP is Associate Vice President for Research
Administration and Executive Director of Technology Transfer. Dr. Sherer
has been a member of the Georgia life sciences community for 10 years.
During this time, he has expanded and led Emory University’s Office of
Technology Transfer, growing the team from a group of eight into a
specialized staff of 20 and leading the program to national prominence.
Dr. Sherer’s efforts, which have resulted in multiple record-setting
years in licensing revenues, licensing agreements and start-ups, have
not only benefited Emory University, but also the broader Atlanta and
Georgia bioscience communities. He established a biannual Breakfast Club
program to pitch promising Emory inventions to the Georgia business
community. The program is designed to give the community an early look
at the exciting technologies being developed at Emory and pair local
entrepreneurs and investors with these opportunities. Further, Dr.
Sherer served as President of the EmTech Biotechnology incubator and
oversaw its seed fund targeted at Emory/Georgia Tech collaborative
projects. He helped educate faculty at Georgia universities about
entrepreneurship by bringing the Kauffman Foundation FastTrac®
TechVenture™ Program to Atlanta. He has contributed his time and energy
to strengthening the bioscience industry as a member of the Southern
Bioalliance Board, Wallace H. Coulter Translational Fund Review
Committee, Georgia Research Alliance VentureLab Advisory Board, and
Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Working
Group. He has also assisted the boards of numerous local biotechnology
start-ups including Curry Pharmaceuticals and Metastatix. Dr. Sherer is
the Immediate Past President of the Association of University Technology
Managers (AUTM), which represents over 300 organizations from 30
countries, and remains a key member of the organization’s board. In
addition, he serves on the Southeast BIO (SEBIO) board of directors and
is Conference Co-Chair of the upcoming SEBIO investor forum being held
in Atlanta later this year.
Other leading companies, executives, researchers and dedicated
individuals will receive Georgia Bio Awards for the following categories
(listed alphabetically by award title):
-
Deals of the Year Awards - Arbor Pharmaceuticals, LLC.; Clearside
Biomedical Inc.; CorMatrix Cardiovascular, Inc.; EndoChoice, Inc.;
Royal Philips & Georgia Regents Health System
-
Emerging Leader of the Year - Dana Fallaize, Emory University
-
Industry Growth Awards – David Hartnett, Metro Atlanta Chamber; David
Perryman, DRIVE LLC
-
Innovation Awards - Amy Baxter, MD, CEO, MMJ Labs; Ami Klin, Ph.D.,
Director, Marcus Autism Center
-
Legislator of the Year Award - Representative Ben Watson (R-166)
-
Phoenix Award - Merial LTD & the University of Georgia
-
Teacher of the Year - Julie A. Johnson, RN, MSN/MBA, Ed.S., Social
Circle High School
For a list of past Georgia Bio Award recipients, click
here.
Georgia Bio (www.gabio.org)
is the private, non-profit association whose members include
pharmaceutical, biotechnology and medical device companies, medical
centers, universities and research institutes, government groups and
other business organizations involved in the development of life
sciences related products and services.
Note to Editors: Credentialed
members of the news media are invited to attend. Registration is
complimentary. Please contact Maria Thacker (404-920-2042; maria.thacker@gabio.org).
Copyright Business Wire 2014