Ms. Anu Acharya
Founder & CEO, Ocimum Biosolutions

Ms. Acharya is the founder & CEO of Ocimum Biosolutions, a global genomics outsourcing partner for discovery, development and diagnostics. The company was founded in the year 2000 and has completed 3 international acquisitions, Gene Logic’s Genomics Division from Maryland, USA, in the year 2007, Isogen Life Sciences from The Netherlands in 2006, and the GD business of MWG Biotech of Germany in 2005. Ocimum today has over 2000 customers worldwide and operates under the main business units of Lab, Sample and Data Management; BioResearch Design and Execution; Data Analytics and Insights; and Integrated Solutions. Ocimum has raised capital from Kubera Cross Border Fund (KUBC) for an equity investment of up to US$17 million (including the pro rata investment by affiliates of Kubera Partners, LLC, the Investment Manager of KUBC). Ocimum was previously financed by the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private Equity arm of the World Bank.

Prior to founding Ocimum Biosolutions, Ms. Acharya has had rich experience in the Telecom, IT and entrepreneurship arenas. She worked for a startup in the telecommunications space called Mantiss Information and a consulting firm called SEI Information where she helped create a social networking site for entrepreneurs. Her experience is backed by education at premier institutions like the Indian Institute of Technology at Kharagpur, India (IIT) and University of Illinois where she has two Post Graduate degrees in Physics and MIS.

She is a regular in technology forums and round tables and one of the well known first generation entrepreneurs in the Indian life sciences space. She was named by Red Herring Magazine to the list of "25 Tech Titans under 35" in 2006. Ocimum has received several awards including "Fastest Growing Life Sciences Company in India", Red Herring Asia 100, "IT Innovation Award" by NASSCOM and has been named to the Deloitte list of Fastest Growing companies in Asia, four years in a row. She has been named Biospectrum “Entrepreneur of the Year” for 2008 and also has been awarded the Astia Life Science Innovators Award in the same year.

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Mr. Subash Lingareddy
Founder, President & CFO, Ocimum Biosolutions

Mr. Subash Lingareddy is a Financial Professional and a CFA charter holder with over six years of experience working in several roles from an equity analyst to a financial risk manager, before joining Ocimum. He has an MBA from the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign with a concentration in Corporate Finance. He has a MS in Financial Mathematics from the University of Chicago specializing in risk management. He has a Bachelors degree in Physics from the Indian Institute of Technology at Kharagpur.

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Dr. Norrie J W Russell
President, Gene Logic

With more than 30 years of experience in drug discovery, Dr. Russell has a long history of success driving innovation in pharmaceutical discovery and development. He also has experience leading entrepreneurial biotechnology companies, raising capital, and developing pioneering new technologies. Prior to joining Gene Logic, Dr. Russell has held leadership roles with NovaRx, Invitrogen, Aviva Biosciences, and Lynx Therapeutics.

Prior to moving to the United States, Dr. Russell had a long career at AstraZeneca, where he was Global Head, Biological Science and Technology, with responsibility for the application of genomics, genetics and proteomics to both target discovery and the entire research and development process. Dr. Russell also has headed several functions, including Target Discovery, International Genomics and Biotechnology.

Dr. Russell holds a Ph. D. in Physiology from Glasgow University, Scotland.

Dr. Jarlath M. ffrench-Mullen
Vice President of Operations and Scientific Director, Ocimum Biosolutions

Dr. ffrench-Mullen will provide oversight to ensure integrity in all scientific and business processes. With over 30 years experience in the pharmaceutical industry, he has expertise in translational medicine, genomic technologies, and CNS disorders. At Gene Logic, Dr. ffrench-Mullen was responsible for building the CNS database, the world’s largest proprietary collection of over 6,000 CNS tissues which were then profiled on the Affymetrix platform. His current research focus is gene expression and miRNA in human blood and brain in disease. Dr. ffrench-Mullen has 50+ scientific publications in psychiatric disorders, addiction, obesity and Parkinson’s disease.

Prior to joining Gene Logic, Dr. ffrench-Mullen was with AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals (formerly Zeneca Pharmaceuticals) where he led integrative, multidisciplinary research programs and drug discovery validation teams in various CNS areas. He has conducted studies ranging from genomics to single cell electrophysiology/pharmacology analyses to the whole animal. He previously held adjunct faculty positions at the University of Delaware and Hahneman University and was a Research Associate at NINDS, NIH.

Dr. ffrench-Mullen received his Ph.D. in Physiology from The George Washington University Medical School. He focused on epilepsy while a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Neurology at The Johns Hopkins Medical School. As a postdoctoral fellow, he also conducted single channel GABA-A studies at the Department of Physiology, Faculty of Medicine, Kyushu University in Japan.

Mr. Vinay Kumar
VP, BioResearch, India, Ocimum Biosolutions

Vice President at Ocimum Biosolutions, Vinay is responsible for on-time and quality delivery of Bioresearch services offered from Ocimum’s Hyderabad and IJsselstein labs. He also assists in corporate strategy, mergers/acquisitions/divestitures, collaborations and partnerships.

Vinay has over 10 years of experience in the high-technology industries in various functions – sales, operations, consulting; as well as extensive entrepreneurial experience. Vinay holds an MBA in Marketing and Technology from the Indian School of Business, Hyderabad, and a Bachelors in Technology degree from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi.

Mr. Tom Thompson
VP, BioIT Sales, Ocimum Biosolutions

Mr. Thompson is the Vice President of Sales of the BioIT Division of Ocimum Biosolutions. He joined Ocimum through the Gene Logic Genomics Division acquisition in 2007. During his nine years at Gene Logic he has been a key member sales management and direct sale teams that built the gene expression database business. Prior to Gene Logic, Mr. Thompson held sales, marketing, and sales/marketing management roles during thirteen years of service at GE Healthcare (formerly Amersham Pharmacia Biotech). Mr. Thompson holds a M.S. in Microbiology and Immunology from Indiana University and a B.A. in Biology from Wabash College.

Dr. Howard Rosenberg
VP, Informatics, Ocimum Biosolutions

Dr. Howard Rosenberg is the Executive Director – LIMS at Ocimum Biosolutions. Howard has extensive experience in scientific software solution development as well as enterprise software and services sales and marketing. With over 20 years of experience addressing the needs of the pharmaceutical and biotech industries for software solutions across both R&D and QA, Howard also has broad domain knowledge that enables him to provide high value to our clients. Howard holds a Ph.D. from Duke University in Analytical Chemistry as well as a Bachelors of Arts (Cum Laude) with Honors in Chemistry from Brandeis University.