ABI-LAB’s senior leadership team is made up of industry leaders with proven track records of success. They offer support in a multitude of ways to minimize risk along the way to critical company milestones—from mentoring, providing alternate resources and other means of support. ABI-LAB is the product of a few great minds who came together for one common goal, to help you and your team thrive. With the collaboration of our leadership team, the possibilities of discoveries are endless!
Dr. Raphael Nir, Chief Scientific Officer
Dr. Nir serves as Chief Scientific Officer at ABI-LAB. He is a scientist, entrepreneur and angel investor with over 26 years of experience commercializing recombinant cytokines and pre-clinical contract research services. With a wealth of experience as both a scientist and entrepreneur, Dr. Raphael Nir, can quickly understand the scientific aspects and help smooth the transition to being a biotech entrepreneur while simultaneously connecting residents to the resources they need to thrive. Dr. Nir is the co-founder of two pre-clinical contract research organizations; SBH Sciences and Woodland Biosciences and three biotechnology companies: Karyopharm Therapeutics (NASDAQ: KPTI), Galectin Sciences and Alma Bio Therapeutics. Dr. Nir is also the co-founder of SBH Diagnostics and Sky Ventures. Since 1997, Dr. Nir has served as the President and Chief Scientific Officer of SBH Sciences where he manages all company’s R&D and business activities. During this time he has worked with over 180 companies. He received his Ph.D. in biotechnology from Tel Aviv University and a Masters in Management from New Jersey Institute of Technology.
Gary Kaufman, Chief Operating Officer
Mr. Kaufman serves as Chief Operating Officer at ABI-LAB. Along with his partners at ABI-LAB Mr. Kaufman is an angel investor in a multitude of biotech ventures, and he is currently in the process of creating an investment vehicle to fund an additional two to four companies a year. For over 30 years he has been a successful entrepreneur, with expertise in consumer-related businesses ranging from residential and commercial real estate to automotive and consumer vending. Mr. Kaufman is the president of Shelby Enterprises Inc., a commercial and residential real estate firm. In addition to his real estate background, Mr. Kaufman has played a significant role in the Metrowest startup community as co-founder and vice chairman of the Metrowest Life Sciences Network, an organization whose mission is to foster awareness of and promote professional networking opportunities among the regions scientific and entrepreneurial ecosystem in the Metrowest region. He has a BS in Management Science from Bridgewater State College with advanced studies at Tel Aviv University and Harvard University.
David Pratt, Principal
Mr. Pratt is a Principal at ABI-LAB, and in this capacity, he is involved in the design and development of ABI-LAB’s second facility. Due to his experience with real estate development, municipal permitting and building design, ABI-LAB 2 took less than 24 months from concept-to-occupancy. Mr. Pratt also works with entrepreneurs, economic development organizations, scientists and life science partners to support the ABI-LAB’s biotech incubator community. Prior to his focus on real estate, he had decades of experience operating and building companies in the B2B e-commerce and ERP software industries. He has worked with startups as both a technology and strategy consultant and serves as a board member for both a private company and a non-profit. Mr. Pratt has a BA in Economics from Tufts University.
Operations Director: Megan Walden
Megan joined ABI-LAB in Spring 2022 as our new Operations Director. She brings several years experience as an Operations Manager in the medical field. Megan has a deep love of science and understanding the inner workings of living things. Using her background, she hopes to help streamline processes at ABI-LAB to create a creative and collaborative research environment. In her free time, Megan writes short stories and is currently working on a science fiction novel.
Operations and Events: Michelle Pinkham
Michelle joined the ABI-LAB team in the summer of 2022 as an Operations Assistant and Event Planner. She supports the buildings’ daily functions, allowing the scientists to focus on their science in a state-of-the-art facility. Michelle’s events bring laboratories together to learn and form a life science community within ABI-LAB. Outside of work Michelle is part of a busy family of 5 and her favorite family member is her Black Lab Puck.
Partnerships & Marketing: Dan Diggins
Dan joined ABI-LAB in September of 2022 to revamp and expand their strategic partnerships, grow their business development plans, and improve their overall marketing efforts. Dan brings an unorthodox skillset and prior work experience to the life sciences industry, as his previous positions in partnerships and marketing were within the sports industry. In his free time, Dan enjoys spending time with family, friends, and skiing in the winter.
Scientific Advisory Board
Gary LWG Robinson, PHD
Dr. Robinson has been a Biotech entrepreneur and early stage drug development expert for over 20 years. He has provided effective strategic planning and operations reviews and support through his biotech service company, PhaseDesing Research (PDR) for over 20 years.
As founder and principal at PDR, Dr. Robinson success is centered on regulatory and clinical planning expertise, enhanced by deep experience in primary pharmacology and IND enabling preclinical studies. He also is an grant-funding expert and sits on different translational grant review panels. Dr. Robinson specializes in identifying appropriate cost-efficient project plans that attain rapid, value-creating, meaningful milestones, and regulatory agreement or proof of clinical relevance data. Dr. Robinson also has broad experience in drug substance, drug product manufacture and formulation development.
Eliezer Zomer, PHD
Dr. Zomer is Vice President in Drug Discovery & Manufacturing at Galectin Therapeutics.
Dr. Zomer has been a leader in biotechnology research, chemical engineering, and drug discovery for over 30 years. This includes 15 years of extensive research and development in pharmaceuticals and clinical diagnostics. He has also managed multiple programs for industrial and regulatory applications using his vast knowledge in scale-up manufacturing under GMP and GLP method development, in-vitro diagnostic, validation and regulatory submission. Dr. Zomer has also managed, developed, and submitted standard operation and validation protocols for regulatory approval in clinical, veterinary and agrochemical fields.
Dr. Raphael Nir, Chief Scientific Officer
Raphael Nir, co-founder of ABI-LAB, is the third member of our advisory board. More information about Dr. Nir can be found above.