Maria Fardis, Ph.D., is a Venture Partner at Frazier Life Sciences and is the Chair of Board of Directors at Obsidian Therapeutics and a member of the Board at CRISPR Therapeutics. She has over 20 years of scientific and management experience in numerous public and private companies. Dr. Fardis previously served as President and Chief Executive Officer of Iovance Biotherapeutics, a publicly traded Biotechnology company. As CEO at Iovance, she led the transformation from an early-stage development company to a company with multiple late-stage programs for the treatment of solid tumors with TIL cell therapy. Prior to Iovance, Dr. Fardis served as the Chief Operating Officer of Acerta Pharma B.V., where she worked on the development of Calquence® until the company’s acquisition by AstraZeneca. Prior to that, she worked at Pharmacyclics, Inc., where she was a key contributor in the creation of a broad clinical program leading to global approvals for Imbruvica® in multiple hematologic malignancies, and where she served as Chief of Oncology Operations and Alliances. Before Pharmacyclics, Dr. Fardis held increasing senior positions in medicinal chemistry and the project and portfolio management at Gilead Sciences, Inc., where she was involved with multiple therapeutic areas including antivirals, oncology, and cardiovascular therapeutics and worked on the development and life cycle management of Letairis®. Maria received her Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley and her B.S. summa cum laude, in chemistry from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. She also holds an M.B.A., received with highest honors, from Golden Gate University.
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