SpeeDx | Executive Team

Team

Founded in 2009, SpeeDx is an Australian-based private company with offices in London and the US, and distributors across Europe. Supported by strong equity base, we are a rapidly growing company with a dynamic portfolio of technology at the
cutting edge of molecular diagnostics.

Directors

Jonathan O. Clark | Chairman

Mr. Clark currently serves as an Advisor to Northpond Ventures. Northpond Ventures is a multi-billion-dollar science-driven venture capital firm based in Cambridge, MA; San Francisco, CA; and Bethesda, MD. Northpond has consistently been named one of the most active lead life science investors in venture industry rankings. It is deeply engaged in the academic ecosystem, having founded The Laboratory for Bioengineering Research and Innovation at the Wyss Institute at Harvard University; launched the MIT-Northpond Program – Advancing Life Science & Engineering Innovation; launched the Northpond Laboratories — Program for Research and Innovation at Stanford Medicine; and sponsored a prize for women entrepreneurs at MIT. It has led or co-led over 60 financings over the past several years and sits on the board of the vast majority of these businesses.

 

Mr. Clark joined Northpond Ventures in 2022 and advises across a broad range of operational and strategic challenges faced by Northpond Ventures’ portfolio companies. In 2023, Mr. Clark was appointed to serve as Chairman of the Board of SpeeDx, one of Northpond Ventures’ portfolio companies.

 

Mr. Clark comes to Northpond Ventures after a diverse career of over 35 years in global operational roles across a broad base of industries and regions. Mr. Clark spent 19 years at Danaher Corporation in expanding operational and executive roles. He most recently reported to the CEO as the Senior Vice President of High Growth Markets where he was responsible for Australia, Asia- including China, Africa and Middle East, Eastern Europe, and Central and South America.

 

Mr. Clark brings a range of public, private, and non-profit board experiences which include serving as a board member of TOA DKK, a leading Japanese instrumentation company; Envista- a leading publicly-traded dental technology company; and H2O Care, a private equity-backed platform of water solution providers. Mr. Clark also serves as an Executive Advisor to the largest charter school in New York, New York. On a personal level, Mr Clark and his wife have founded a not-for-profit foundation – Education for Hope, which sponsors young adults in Kaberamaido, Uganda who are pursing their dream to become a nurse or midwife. Mr. Clark serves as a board member as well as the treasurer and secretary to the foundation.

 

Throughout his career, Mr. Clark and his family have worked and resided in the United Kingdom; Shanghai, China; Dubai, UAE, as well as the USA. Mr. Clark earned his B.A from the University of Buffalo majoring in Business Administration

Bianca Ogden

Bianca Ogden | Non Executive Director

MBio PhD

After spending some time at Swiss pharmaceuticals company Novartis researching new HIV drugs (one of which has been approved and is in use today), Dr. Ogden went on to complete a PhD at University College London, investigating Kaposi’s sarcoma-associated herpesvirus. She then migrated to Australia and joined Johnson & Johnson as a molecular biologist, researching new drug targets in oncology.

Dr. Ogden embarked on a career change in 2003 and joined Platinum as an investment analyst. Her rich knowledge base in molecular biology and first-hand insights into the pharmaceutical and biotech industry give her a unique ability to delve deeply into the fundamentals of healthcare companies.
At Platinum Bianca manages the Platinum International Health Care Fund and leads the healthcare sector team.

Lily Li | Non Executive Director

PhD

Lily Li is a Principal at Northpond Ventures where she focuses on investments in life science tools, diagnostics and precision medicine. Lily is a board director at 1859 Inc and Ansa Biotechnologies, and holds board observer roles at ChromaCode, Delfi Diagnostics, Emulate, Encodia, Ultivue, and Vizgen.

She was a board director at Personal Genome Diagnostics (PGDx) which was acquired by LabCorp. Previously, Lily was an Associate Director of Corporate and Business Development at Illumina (NASDAQ: ILMN), where she structured and led strategic partnerships to support company growth across clinical markets.

Prior to Illumina, Lily led strategic marketing and business development at NanoString Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: NSTG). Lily was also a management consultant in the life sciences practice at L.E.K. Consulting, where she served as a strategic advisor to a broad range of corporate clients and life science investors. Lily received her Ph.D. in molecular and systems pharmacology from Emory University. She also holds a B.S. in biology from Tsinghua University.

Vicki DiFrancesco | Non Executive Director

Ms. Vicki DiFrancesco, one of the most influential leaders in the laboratory industry, was formerly responsible for building and executing XiFiN’s corporate business development strategies including acquisitions, joint ventures and strategic partnerships that advance company growth. After retiring from XiFiN, she is now a Strategic Advisor for the company.

Prior to XIFIN, Vicki served as President and CEO of Pathology Inc., the west coast’s premier women’s health laboratory that was acquired by LabCorp in March 2016. Previously, DiFrancesco was Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Spectrum Laboratory Network where she grew revenues and drove expansion into new markets. She also served as Senior Vice President, Sales and Marketing for Specialty Laboratories Inc., where she oversaw marketing, customer service and was instrumental in sale of company to Ameripath in 2005.

Earlier in her career, Vicki worked as the Vice President of Hospital Sales and Marketing at Quest Diagnostics, Inc..  She has also held executive level positions with American Medical Laboratories, sold to Quest Diagnostics, and Laboratory Corporation of America. Vicki formerly served on the Board of Directors of PWNHealth, LLC, sold to Spectrum Equity.

Ms DiFrancesco was recently appointed first member of US HealthTek’s newly implemented Advisory Board in March 2023.
Ingo Chakravarty

Ingo Chakravarty | Non Executive Director

Ingo Chakravarty is an Operating Partner at Northpond Ventures.

He has 30 years of experience in building, scaling and leading high-performance teams and companies in the diagnostics and precision medicine sectors.

Ingo was recently President and CEO of Mesa, which he successfully sold to Thermo Fisher Scientific in 2021.

Prior to Mesa, Ingo held multiple executive roles in the diagnostics and precision medicine sectors, including CEO of Navican Genomics, SVP and GM of GenMark Diagnostics, (acquired by Roche), VP and GM of Gen-Probe (acquired by Hologic), and various leadership roles at Ventana Medical Systems (acquired by Roche). He received a degree in electrical engineering from the Friedrich Heacker School in Germany.

Executives

Founded in 2009, SpeeDx is an Australian-based private company with offices in London and the US, and distributors across Europe. SpeeDx employs a growing number of team members across our three offices in Sydney, Austin, and London. Follow us on LinkedIn for more information about SpeeDx careers.

Colin Denver

Colin Denver | Chief Executive Officer

Colin Denver is an experienced sales professional with nearly 20  years sales experience working in the Life Science and Diagnostic fields. He has experience in establishing new organisations having set up Bioline in Australia in 2004. Colin enjoyed continued growth while at Bioline with quarter on quarter growth achieved since inception. Colin went on to manage sales in Asia/Pacific for Meridian Bioscience (post Bioline acquisition) and drove consistent growth within the territory.

Colin started as Vice President of Sales and Marketing for SpeeDx, responsible for the promotion of all SpeeDx branded products as well as acquisition of new licensing and commercial agreements. He now holds the role of CEO, overseeing the expansion of SpeeDx as products are launched across Europe, United States and Australia/New Zealand. Colin holds a Bachelor of Science from Pepperdine University and a Post Graduate Diploma of Management from MGSM.

Elisa Mokany

Elisa Mokany | Chief Technology Officer

PhD

Elisa Mokany is a co-founder and the Chief Technology Officer at SpeeDx. In this role she leads the development of innovative diagnostic technologies and commercialization of infectious disease and antibiotic resistance tests. Elisa has over 20 years’ experience in medical research, she has worked for St Vincent’s hospital developing tests for the diagnosis of colorectal cancer and later at Johnson & Johnson Research (JJR) where she developed diagnostic tests for leukemia and was involved in the commercialisation of proprietary technology known as DzyNA PCR.

While at JJR, Elisa undertook studies towards her PhD, which involved co-invention of the novel nucleic acid technology, PlexZymes . Elisa is an inventor on 8 patents/patent applications involving nucleic acid analysis including the novel PlexPrime technology which has multiple applications in the in vitro diagnostic field. Elisa studied at the University of NSW, obtaining a BSc (Hons 1st Class) and later completed her PhD at JJR in conjunction with the School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Science at the University of New South Wales.

Bhavin Raval

Bhavin Raval | Chief Financial Officer

Bhavin Raval has nearly 30 years of financial leadership experience across a broad range of industries including the last 18 years with Life Science and Biotech companies. He brings financial and executive leadership experience to SpeeDx in the areas of business operations, fiscal management and strategy, commercial partnering, M&A and integration activities, and private equity fundraising. His previous employers include Johnson & Johnson Research Pty Limited, Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute and Calimmune Inc. He was a part of the senior management team of Calimmune Inc. that was acquired by CSL for a value of up to USD 416 M in August 2017. Bhavin is a Fellow Member of CPA Australia as well as a Fellow Member of the Governance Institute of Australia.

Alison Todd

Alison Todd | Chief Scientific Officer

PhD, FTSE

Adj/Professor Alison Todd co-founded SpeeDx in 2009 and is its Chief Scientific Officer. She is an elected Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering; and along with Dr Elisa Mokany, was the recipient of academy’s Clunies Ross Innovation Award in 2020 for “discovery, development, and adoption of a technology that has significantly improved societal or industry capabilities”.

Alison is a serial inventor with a portfolio of 18 patent families that comprises over 85 granted patents which protect SpeeDx ‘s IP including PlexZyme and PlexPrime. She is a pioneer in the field of personalised medicine, having pursued a career which has focused on developing  and commercialising diagnostic tests for the tailoring and monitoring of therapy for patients with cancer or infectious diseases.

Prior to founding SpeeDx, Alison was a Senior Research Director at Johnson and Johnson Research Pty Limited, Sydney.  She spent nearly 20 years within the pharmaceutical industry and was internationally recognised  with the Johnson & Johnson Philip B. Hofmann Research Scientist Award for outstanding achievement in R&D.

Alison studied at the University of Sydney, obtaining a BSc (Hons 1st Class) before completing a PhD through the Faculty of Medicine in conjunction with Royal Prince Alfred Hospital. Alison maintains an active involvement within the academic community and is an  Adjunct Professor at the University of New South Wales.

Contact SpeeDx for more information on Resistance Guided Therapy.