Joana co–founded Exogenus Therapeutics in 2015, after a successful participation in COHiTEC program for technology commercialization. Having been awarded several honors, including three entrepreneurship prizes (Everis Foundation Award, Young Entrepreneur ANJE, and Prémio Empreendedor XXI BPI/CaixaBank), Joana has raised €3.5M in funds for R&D, and is currently a leader in the field of EV–based therapeutics recognized internationally. With a PhD in Human Biology, she dedicated 20 years of her career to R&D in the area of human diseases and healthcare, is inventor of two patents, has several publications in high impact journals, and is invited researcher of the Center for Neuroscience and Cell Biology (CNC, Coimbra, Portugal). Joana is an enthusiastic entrepreneur and activist, with a creative mindset and a strong drive to solve healthcare challenges.

With over 18 years of experience bridging science and markets, Pedro Vilarinho supported several start-ups that attracted over €50M in investments, and joined six scientific start-ups, as a board member. As a founding member of COTED Portugal, Pedro was responsible for several entrepreneurship programs, including COHiTEC, that launched Exogenus Therapeutics. In 2006, he was awarded with the Price Foundation Innovative Entrepreneurship Educators Award, from the Stanford Technology Ventures Program. Pedro now acts as Director General of HiSeedTech and lectured for nearly 20 years at the University of Aveiro (Portugal).

Walter is currently a Director at Caixa Capital, the venture capital and private equity arm of Caixa Geral de Depósitos, Portugal’s largest financial group. Walter has over twenty years of professional experience, both in Portugal and internationally. Walter began his career with KMPG Canada, having transferred to the Portuguese office in 1991, where he specialized in the financial services sector and Corporate Finance. He later moved to Banco Finantia, a Portuguese investment bank, where he acted as Head of Equity Research and later as a Director in the Corporate Finance department. In 2001, Walter moved to the CGD Group to help found a corporate venturing operation specialised in investing in and developing internet and technology start-ups. Walter has an MBA in International Management from Universidade Católica Portuguesa and an Honours Commerce & Finance degree from the University of Toronto (Canada).

Raúl serves as the Chief Scientific Officer and a Venture Partner at 3xP Global, where he oversees the firm’s health and life sciences vertical. With a background in life sciences venture capital, including positions at Apple Tree Partners (London, United Kingdom) and Portugal Ventures (Porto, Portugal), he has participated in numerous investment deals both within Portugal and overseas, such as CellmAbs and Aethon Therapeutics. He has previously held board-level positions in nine biotech companies in different stages of development. Additionally, he has served in operational roles in nascent startups as part of venture building exercises. Raúl holds a PhD in Molecular Microbiology and Immunology from Johns Hopkins University, and also trained in biochemistry for his BSc and MSc at Universidade do Porto.

Miguel Lemos began his professional career in 1992 at Deutsche Bank Investment. Throughout his career in the capital markets, he held responsibilities in Sales for both national and global institutional clients, as well as in proprietary portfolio management. He worked in the bond and equity markets, notably at Midas Brokerage, which was later acquired by BBVA. Miguel has also served as an investor relations consultant at Explorer Advisors and as an independent advisor, assisting some of the largest national companies in managing their relationships with analysts and shareholders. Currently, Miguel is a board member of 3xP Global, where he is responsible for the selection, negotiation, and monitoring of portfolio companies within the funds managed by this asset management firm. He holds a degree in Economics from Universidade Nova de Lisboa and has completed various further education programs, including a Postgraduate degree in Finance and Corporate Control and the CESGA (Certified ESG Analyst) certification from EFFAS.

Catarina is a board-certified Medical Oncologist, who has worked as a clinician (8+ years) and researcher (MSc, Fellowship, PGDip) for over 18 years.
In 2016 she pivoted to commercial research, having worked for a top-5 CRO, mid-size Biotech and mid-size Pharma, overseeing global Hem/Onc trials from Ph1 to Ph4, across indications and the spectrum of systemic anti-cancer therapies. She has led CTAs, protocol amendments, set up DSMBs, written CSRs and participated in due diligence processes.
She continues her pursuit of better and safer innovative medicinal products for oncology patients as Medical Director, Global Clinical Development Oncology at Merck Healthcare, and is also using her strategic thinking and market orientation skills at Exogenus Therapeutics and Genotrial.

Mario Pinto is the founder and leader of Change Partners, a Portuguese Venture Capital firm that is a shareholder in several innovative ventures, including in the healthcare sector and pharmaceutical industry. Mario’s expertise include business development within the life science sector, in which he helped several projects reach market, as a Board Member. He worked in credit, consulting, mergers & acquisitions and private equity, and was an Executive Board Member in one of the major financial institutions in Portugal, bank BPI (Banco Português de Investimento). Mario graduated in Economics from University of Porto and was a lecturer at the same university.

Luísa has expertise in Marketing and Business Development, with over 18 years of professional experience. With a focus on Innovation Management, Proposition Design and Partnership Development, Luísa supported nationally–and internationally–recognized projects, and raised over €2.7M in funds from investors and grants. She holds an MBA from Porto Business School and worked for major international firms, such as Barclays Bank and MasterCard.

Patricia leads Exogenus’ innovation efforts, driving new projects within the company’s internal pipeline and through strategic collaborations with external partners. She holds a PhD from the Medical University of Vienna, Austria, and completed postdoctoral training at the University Hospital of Luebeck, Germany, both in dermatology. Her research on autoimmune skin diseases has been published in leading dermatology journals and earned prestigious awards. Patricia is a co-inventor on two company patents and plays a key role in securing non-dilutive funding.

Andreia is a nanomedicine researcher dedicated to the development of advanced nanosystems for delivery of new drug modalities. Her expertise includes production and characterization of extracellular vesicles and their engineering for targeted delivery of nucleic acids and protein cargo, and comparison with other nanotechnologies (viral or LNPs) for different therapeutic applications. After obtaining her PhD in Biomedical Sciences from the University of Porto, she integrated competitive industrial scientific teams such as in AstraZeneca (Gothenburg, Sweden) and Anjarium Biosciences (Zurich, Switzerland). Her scientific work resulted in >30 publications in indexed scientific journals with high impact-factor and one patent, spanning the topics of advanced drug delivery systems, RNA biology and tissue repair and regeneration. As Head of Research at Exogenus Therapeutics, she will combine her technical and scientific expertise, with her experience in project management and leadership, leading our scientific team and efforts.

Cláudia Oliveira is an experienced researcher with a broad scientific expertise in nanomedicine, including in carbon nanotubes, liposomes, exosomes and other types of extracellular vesicles and lipid carriers. Across these technologies, she has focused on studies at the molecular and cellular level, aiming to optimize them as tools for future clinical use.
She has graduated with honors from the University of Málaga (Spain) and have worked in leading international nanomedicine-related laboratories in The Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and UK.

Tania´s research focused on the mechanical cues effect on oligodendrocyte differentiation.            She holds a master’s in Molecular and Cell Biology and performed her PhD at the Center for Neurosciences of the University of Coimbra (Portugal), in collaboration with the Karolinska Institute (Sweden). Her work contributed to several publications in oligodendrocyte biology in top journals, including Nature Communications. She also holds an MBA from University of Coimbra (Portugal).

Dora Costa is a versatile Organic Chemist with expertise in synthesis of bioactive small molecules and development of natural-based hydrogels. She is skilled in rheological and mechanical testing, chromatography, mass spectrometry, NMR and IR spectroscopy and bioprinting technology, and her work has contributed to 28 peer-reviewed papers and 8 patents.  She received the Best PhD Thesis award from PPGQ at Universidade Federal Fluminense and a Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions Seal of Excellence in 2019. Recently, she has focused on processing natural macromolecules, particularly human-derived proteins for mammalian cell encapsulation.

Rita is a bioengineer with an MSc in Molecular Biotechnology from the University of Porto (Portugal), and a PhD from the University of Salzburg (Austria). She has hands-on experience in a wide range of life science fields, namely through studying the effects of nanoparticles on human antigen-presenting cells. Her career included an INOV Contact internship at the Biotechnology Institute in Helsinki (Finland), work on mRNA-based therapies using lipid nanoparticles, at AstraZeneca (Sweden), and PhD secondments in Spain and Norway. Rita is certified in quality management systems and clinical research sciences. Her main interest lies in the exploitation of nanomedicines and their translation to the clinic.

Sílvio’s expertise are in Sales, Communication and Marketing, including online Marketing. He holds a degree in Economy from the University of Coimbra and worked for major Portuguese Companies, such as Páginas Amarelas. Sílvio’s work experience is complemented by frequent participation in complementary courses in pedagogy, group dynamics and human relations.

Graça Raposo is an internationally recognized expert in the field of extracellular vesicles, with over 220 original publications (HFactor: 92) and 3 patents. Her achievements include the CNRS Silver Medal and the Descartes Huygens Price from the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences (2012), a Portuguese recognition for being among the most ground-breaking Portuguese scientists (2016), the ISEV achievement award (2018) and the Miller Professorship award from Berkeley University (2019-2020). With over 30 years of experience and numerous international and industrial collaborations, Graça is also actively involved in science outreach. She is currently a Research Director at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS, France) and Head of the Structure and Membrane Compartments research team in the Department of Cell Biology and Cancer (UMR144-CNRS) at Institut Curie.

Founder of the oldest company worldwide dedicated to exosome research (HansaBioMed Life Sciences), Antionio Chiesi is recognized by his 12-year career leading highly innovative companies, including Exosomics. He served ten years as Head of Research at the Istituto Superiore di Sanità (Italian National Institute of Health) and is a former Director of the Agency for Research on Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (Italy). His scientific interests span several clinical research projects in the field of HIV-AIDS and Cancer, having been appointment as a Country Expert in several EU programs in the HIV/AIDS and Cancer fields. He now acts as CEO of HansaBioMed Life Sciences and Exosomics.

With nearly 20 years of experience as a pulmonologist, Tiago Alfaro’s research interests include interstitial and inflammatory lung diseases, with 28 co-authorships in original publications or book chapters. Currently, he is a Pulmonologist and Laboratory Coordinator at the University Medical Center of Coimbra (Portugal), Assistant Professor at the Medical University of Coimbra (Portugal), Associate Editor of the Pulmonology Journal (formerly, Portuguese Pulmonology Journal), Board Member of the Portuguese Medical Association’s Pulmonology Section, and Vice-President of the Portuguese Pulmonology Society.

Eric Chevalier is a senior R&D leader with over 30 years of experience in Drug Discovery, Research, Pre-clinical, Translational Science, and early Drug Development. He has held leadership roles at Jouveinal, Parke-Davis, Pfizer, AstraZeneca, Polyphor/Spexis, and Bial, including VP/Director of Research, Head of Non-Clinical Development, and Global Programs & Projects Leader. Eric has a proven track record of advancing programs from discovery to clinical studies, with expertise in scientific assessment, portfolio management, strategic vision, business development, talent management, and stakeholder collaboration.

Having occupied various senior R&D and executive positions in 20 years in the corporate sector, and with a strong scientific background in oncology, inflammation and other indications, Kostas Alevizopoulos, PhD, brings significant experience in the development and commercialization of early therapeutic, diagnostic and medical device products. He has managed more than 100 trials with >30 different CROs, was involved in several technology transfer, licensing, fund raising and other financing transactions, has evaluated hundreds of products/technologies for investment, licensing and commercialization purposes and has also been a co-founder of several biotech companies.

Peter has over 30 years’ experience in pharmaceutical and biotechnology R&D, including 25 years with Pfizer and Eli Lilly. During his time at Pfizer and Lilly, Peter performed fundamental research in the pathology of osteoarthritis and led numerous drug discovery teams focusing on developing new drugs to treat joint pain, as well as to provide disease modifying activity. He has extensive experience in osteoarthritis biomarkers, and in the preclinical to clinical translation of drugs targeting this disease. With over 60 peer-reviewed publications spanning pharmacology, analytical chemistry, cell biology, molecular biology and biochemistry, Peter brings a multidisciplinary approach to drug development. Since leaving his position as Senior Director at Eli Lilly in 2016, he has worked or consulted for several pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, leveraging his R&D experience as both a scientific leader and senior manager.

David is a Marketing and Business Development expert, with over 15 years of experience in healthcare. He holds a BSc in Biology by the University of Nottingham (UK) and is a founder at the strategy and innovation consultancy firm LabToMarket. David has a broad international network and supported multidisciplinary projects in Europe and Africa.