Realizing the Full Promise of RNA Immunotherapies
While immunotherapies have improved outcomes for some patients, many patients unfortunately are not eligible for, or do not respond to, existing immunotherapies. At Oncorus, our goal is to enable more patients to respond to this revolutionary approach of harnessing the body’s immune system to tackle cancer.
Our personal stories of cancer’s insidious impact on the lives of our loved ones, friends, colleagues, and, in some cases, even ourselves, motivates us each day to drive forward our mission to realize the full promise of RNA immunotherapy for cancer patients.
Our Team
Theodore (Ted) Ashburn, MD, PhD
Before becoming Oncorus’ President, CEO and a member of its Board of Directors, Ted was Head of Oncology Development at Moderna Therapeutics, where he was responsible for overall design, integration, and execution of Moderna’s clinical-stage oncology programs. Prior to this role, he led the development of Moderna’s Personalized Cancer Vaccine programs, which became the core technology to enable a rapid response to the COVID19 pandemic. Previously, Ted was Senior Vice President of Product Strategy and Operations at Dicerna Pharmaceuticals and the Global Product Head for Leukine® (sargramostim) and Elitek®/Fasturtec® (rasburicase) for Sanofi Oncology. In this latter role, Dr. Ashburn provided global leadership for R&D and global marketing and led regional commercial teams to identify, develop, prioritize, and execute new commercialization and life-cycle management strategies to drive growth. He was also responsible for negotiating and implementing Sanofi’s 2013 supply, stockpiling and R&D contract with the U.S. Government’s Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA).
Ted joined Sanofi Oncology from Genzyme’s Corporate Development group where he led business development efforts for several of Genzyme’s franchises including transplant, oncology and rare diseases and was responsible for Genzyme’s 2009 deal with ViroPharma. Prior to joining Genzyme, he worked for privately held Dynogen Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and the venture capital firm Oxford Bioscience Partners. While at Oxford he co-founded both Dynogen and BrainCells, Inc. and led investments in Alantos Pharmaceuticals (acquired in June, 2007 by Amgen for $300 million in cash) and superDimension, Ltd. (acquired by Covidien in March, 2012 for more than $300 million). Before joining Oxford, Ted started his career at Pfizer Inc. where he was involved in the analysis of several acquisition and new business opportunities including Pfizer’s acquisition of Warner-Lambert in 2001.
Ted graduated magna cum laude from Ball State University where he studied chemistry and computer science. He earned his M.D. from Harvard Medical School and Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Personal Motivation
"Success is our only option."
Stephanie Duncanson, PhD
Stephanie Duncanson, Ph.D., is the Senior Director of Corporate Strategy & Business Development at Oncorus. Stephanie is responsible for identifying, sourcing, and driving strategic opportunities for Oncorus’ next-generation oncolytic virus platforms. Additionally, she serves as the head of Business Development, alliance manager, and leads IP portfolio development.
Prior to joining Oncorus, Stephanie was a Consultant at Clarion Healthcare, providing strategic support, guidance, and planning to a broad range of biopharmaceutical companies. Stephanie received her Ph.D. in Bioengineering from Georgia Institute of Technology with a focus in cell & gene therapy, and completed her B.S. in Chemical Engineering at Northeastern University.
Personal Motivation
"For me, cancer is personal. Everyday I think of my brother and Aunt who fortunately survived cancer due to medical innovations—and I believe Oncorus’ innovations can offer this hope to others’ brothers, sisters, moms and dads."
John Goldberg, MD
John is Chief Medical Officer at Oncorus. In collaboration with the scientific and manufacturing teams, he is responsible for driving the clinical studies of Oncorus’ viral immunotherapies, and for ongoing development and regulatory strategies.
His prior roles include Senior Medical Director at H3 Biomedicine, clinical development at Agenus, and the leadership of the pediatric oncology Phase 1 program at the University of Miami. John’s immunotherapy experience includes first-in-human neo-antigen vaccines, dendritic cell vaccine and GVAX trials, as well as check point inhibitors and costimulatory agonists. He is a practicing pediatric oncologist with 15 years of experience treating children with cancer and enrolling patients in clinical trials.
John received his pediatric hematology oncology training at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Children’s Hospital Boston, and his general pediatrics training at the University of Rochester. John is a graduate of the University of Massachusetts Medical School and the college of the University of Chicago.
Personal Motivation
"My passion is finding new treatments based on science. I’m inspired by my patients, friends and family members who have been affected by cancer and won’t rest until we can make cures a reality."
Brett Belongia, PhD
Brett is the Vice President of CMC Operations. He and his team are responsible for the strategic direction and operational responsibilities related to the manufacturing, development and quality of oncolytic viruses from early stage clinical development through commercialization.
Most recently, Brett was the Director of Technical Operations at Momenta Pharmaceuticals where he was responsible for the management of external manufacturing activities of novel proteins. Brett’s prior roles included responsibility for operation of a large scale development laboratory and upstream process development teams for biosimilar monoclonal antibody treatments.
Brett is the inventor on 13 patents and an author on multiple publications. Brett received his Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from The University of Arizona after completing his BS in Chemical Engineering at The University of Wisconsin – Madison.
Personal Motivation
"As someone who has had several family members diagnosed with cancer, it is a great privilege to be part of an organization that has the people and technology to truly revolutionize the treatment of cancer."
Stephen W. Harbin
Steve Joins Oncorus at an exciting time in the companies scientific and operational endeavors, bringing with him more than 30 years of diverse operational experience in biotech, pharmaceuticals and in-vitro diagnostics. He served successfully in a variety of senior business and operational leadership roles based in Europe and the U.S. The last 15 years at Executive Committee level split between Public and Private companies.
Steve has consulted with a number of early stage biotech companies on the challenges of operational scale-up to meet growth challenges. Seen as a key player in this space among the Cambridge biotech community.
He joined Moderna Inc. when the company was in a nascent state, his 6 years with them pivotal to driving the successful scale up of this fast paced, hyper-growing biotech ‘unicorn’ holding Executive Committee positions responsible for Clinical and non-Clinical Manufacturing operations, Supply Chain, Facilities & HR. finally retiring when Moderna went public.
Prior to joining Moderna, based in France he held the position of SVP Global Operations at bioMérieux SA, he was responsible for 3,500 employees over multiple highly regulated global functions (Regulatory, Information Technology, Internal Control and Quality) and all global Manufacturing sites (15). In addition to his operational duties Steve also held two board level positions in joint ventures (Japan and China).
In his earlier years Steve held many leadership roles within Eli Lilly and Company (UK, Spain & USA), where work experiences covered many different dimensions including finance, manufacturing, sales, HR and people development all in highly regulated environments. Providing solid credentials in business and operations from very early in his career.
Throughout Steve has demonstrated a clear capability to manage depth, complexity and range holding senior leadership positions driving strategic direction and performance in many different functions and geographies. He has continually refined and reengineered infrastructure, organizations and internal processes driving transformation in response to new business challenges.
Personal Motivation
"You get the culture you deserve"
Board of Directors
Mitchell H. Finer, PhD
Mitchell H. Finer, PhD founded Oncorus and currently serves as Chairman and “Chief Coolhunter”. As Chief Coolhunter, Dr. Finer is ever on the prowl for innovative technologies that will increase the probability of success of existing development programs as well as product opportunities that are synergistic with the existing portfolio and will overall improve the success of the business.
Mitch joined MPM Capital as Managing Director in 2015 and is a member of the board of directors of MPM portfolio company Semma Therapeutics. For three decades Mitch has focused in the areas of regenerative medicine, cancer immunotherapy and cell and gene therapy, helping to advance products from conception through phase III clinical programs. Prior to MPM, Mitch served as CSO of bluebird bio, where he was responsible for strategic build of bluebird’s gene therapy business and led the strategic development of the LentiGlobin product from preclinical research through demonstration of long-term therapeutic benefit and safety in beta-thalassemia patients. Mitch continues to serve on bluebird bio’s scientific advisory board.
Prior to bluebird, Mitch served as CEO of Intracel Corporation and Genteric Inc, and as VP Research for Cell Genesys and the Gencell division of Aventis Pharma (now Sanofi). Mitch also successfully co-founded retinal disease gene therapy company Avalanche Biotechnologies.
Mitch received his PhD in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from Harvard University and a BS in Biochemistry and Microbiology from the University of California at Berkeley. He completed a post-doctoral fellowship at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research at MIT.
Theodore (Ted) Ashburn, MD, PhD
Before becoming Oncorus’ President, CEO and a member of its Board of Directors, Ted was Head of Oncology Development at Moderna Therapeutics, where he was responsible for overall design, integration, and execution of Moderna’s clinical-stage oncology programs. Prior to this role, he led the development of Moderna’s Personalized Cancer Vaccine programs, which became the core technology to enable a rapid response to the COVID19 pandemic. Previously, Ted was Senior Vice President of Product Strategy and Operations at Dicerna Pharmaceuticals and the Global Product Head for Leukine® (sargramostim) and Elitek®/Fasturtec® (rasburicase) for Sanofi Oncology. In this latter role, Dr. Ashburn provided global leadership for R&D and global marketing and led regional commercial teams to identify, develop, prioritize, and execute new commercialization and life-cycle management strategies to drive growth. He was also responsible for negotiating and implementing Sanofi’s 2013 supply, stockpiling and R&D contract with the U.S. Government’s Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA).
Ted joined Sanofi Oncology from Genzyme’s Corporate Development group where he led business development efforts for several of Genzyme’s franchises including transplant, oncology and rare diseases and was responsible for Genzyme’s 2009 deal with ViroPharma. Prior to joining Genzyme, he worked for privately held Dynogen Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and the venture capital firm Oxford Bioscience Partners. While at Oxford he co-founded both Dynogen and BrainCells, Inc. and led investments in Alantos Pharmaceuticals (acquired in June, 2007 by Amgen for $300 million in cash) and superDimension, Ltd. (acquired by Covidien in March, 2012 for more than $300 million). Before joining Oxford, Ted started his career at Pfizer Inc. where he was involved in the analysis of several acquisition and new business opportunities including Pfizer’s acquisition of Warner-Lambert in 2001.
Ted graduated magna cum laude from Ball State University where he studied chemistry and computer science. He earned his M.D. from Harvard Medical School and Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Personal Motivation
"Success is our only option."
Luke Evnin, PhD
Luke Evnin, PhD, co-founded MPM with Ansbert Gadicke in 1997 and opened the San Francisco office in 1999. The MPM team they have led has been the inspiration and driving force behind building companies such as Biomarin (BMRN), CoStim Pharmaceuticals (acquired by Novartis:NVS) , Epizyme (EPZM), Idenix (acquired by Merck:MRK), Pacira (PCRX), Pharmasset (acquired by Gilead:GILD) and Radius (RDUS). MPM believes that these companies are among the biggest successes in biotech history – companies that ultimately resulted in helping thousands of patients live longer and with vastly improved lives. Luke was the lead investor and has served on the boards of several of MPM’s most successful investments including CoStim Pharmaceuticals, Idun Pharmaceuticals, and Pacira.
Prior to co-founding MPM, Luke honed his skills as a venture capitalist beginning in 1990 at Accel Partners where he focused on emerging healthcare companies. Luke’s passion for drug discovery began in college where he received his AB in Molecular Biology from Princeton University. He advanced his technical training and launched his interest in curing disease with his doctoral study in the Department of Biochemistry at the University of California-San Francisco. Luke’s passion for discovering and pushing forward groundbreaking drug discovery companies inspires his work and that of his team.
Luke has devoted significant efforts since 2000 to working with the Scleroderma Research Foundation, serving as Chairman since 2002. Luke also devotes energy to the External Advisory Board at the Lewis-Sigler Institute for Quantitative Genomics at Princeton, serves on the External Advisory Boards for QB3 at UCSF, the Masters in Translational Medicine program at UCSF, and the Boston University Scleroderma CORT.
Douglas Fambrough, PhD
Douglas Fambrough, Ph.D. brings over 25 years of clinical and managerial experience to Oncorus. Most recently, he served as co-founder, President and Chief Executive Officer of Dicerna Pharmaceuticals, a publicly traded biotechnology company focused on RNAi-based therapeutics for various disease areas, including oncology. At Dicerna, he was responsible for overseeing the company’s scientific and business success for nearly 12 years leading up to its acquisition by Novo Nordisk in December 2021 for $3.3 billion.
Prior to Dicerna, Dr. Fambrough was a general partner at Oxford Bioscience Partners, where he has specialized in financing innovative life science technology companies. While at Oxford, Dr. Fambrough led the investment in the first-generation RNA interference company Sirna Therapeutics and other pioneering biotechnology companies, including Solexa, Xencor, Rib-X Pharmaceuticals, and Solstice Neurosciences. Prior to joining Oxford, Dr. Fambrough was a genomic scientist at the Whitehead/MIT Center for Genomic Research, now known as the Broad Institute.
He holds an A.B. in biology from Cornell University and a Ph.D. in genetics from the University of California, Berkeley.
Mary Kay Fenton
Mary Kay currently serves as Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of Semma Therapeutics, an operating subsidiary of Vertex Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: VRTX). She joined Semma Therapeutics from Achillion Pharmaceuticals, which she joined in 2000 and where she later served as Executive Vice President and CFO from 2006 to 2018. At Achillion, Mary Kay was a key member of the executive team and played an instrumental role in the company’s growth, including overseeing multiple public and private capital raises, and leading financial and operational functions.
Prior to joining Achillion, she held various positions within the Technology Industry Group at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, an independent registered public accounting firm, from 1991 to 2000, most recently as Senior Manager responsible for the life sciences practice in Connecticut. Mary Kay holds an M.B.A. in Finance from the Graduate School of Business at the University of Connecticut and an A.B. in Economics from the College of the Holy Cross.
Spencer Nam, MBA
Spencer is a Managing Partner at KSV Global where he focuses on novel technologies and therapeutics in healthcare. Prior to joining KSV Global, Spencer was a senior research fellow at the Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation where he researched disruptive innovation models in healthcare.
Prior to Christensen Institute, Spencer spent 10 years as a licensed securities analyst on Wall Street where he had research coverage on medical devices, diagnostics and life science tools companies.
Before Wall Street, Spencer was a consultant at Bain & Company where he advised senior management teams of Fortune 500 companies. Spencer holds AB in Mathematics from Harvard College and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Eric Rubin, MD
Beginning his oncology career in academia, Eric Rubin, M.D. served as a faculty member at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and then as a senior leader of the Cancer Institute of New Jersey, where he was Director of the Investigational Therapeutics Division. His research efforts focused on mechanisms of resistance to DNA topoisomerase-targeting drugs and his laboratory cloned TOPORS, a novel topoisomerase I- and p53-interacting tumor suppressor gene. In 2008, Dr. Rubin was recruited to Merck to lead the clinical oncology development team. Under his leadership, the clinical oncology group underwent a transformational change to realize the potential of cancer immunotherapy. He led the initial development of the anti-PD-1 antibody pembrolizumab (KEYTRUDA), which was the first anti-PD-1 therapy approved in the U.S., and in the identification of the significant activity of this breakthrough therapeutic across several cancer types. In 2014, Dr. Rubin was asked to head up Oncology Early Development for Merck, and in this role he oversees development of a promising and expansive early pipeline, as well as translational oncology research activities.
Dr. Rubin has authored over 100 original, peer-reviewed publications and book chapters related to oncology translational research, clinical trials, and drug development. He has served frequently as a member of National Cancer Institute and American Cancer Society study sections, as well as on program committees for the American Association of Cancer Research (AACR) and the American Society of Clinical Oncology. He is a co-chair of the Cancer Steering Committee of the Biomarkers Consortium, Foundation of the National Institute of Health, a member of the Science Policy and Governmental Affairs Committee for AACR, and was a member of the National Cancer Moonshot Initiative/Blue Ribbon Panel Working Group on Expanding Clinical Trials.
Barbara Yanni
Ms. Yanni previously served as Vice President and Chief Licensing Officer at Merck & Co., from November 2001 until her retirement in March 2014. Prior to her role of Chief Licensing Officer, Ms. Yanni had various roles at Merck including in corporate development, financial evaluation, and tax. Ms. Yanni is an independent director currently on the boards of three public biotechnology companies in addition to Oncorus: Trevena, Inc., Vaccinex, Inc., and Pharming Group N.V. She is also currently an independent director of Mesentech, a private biotechnology company. She previously served on the Board of Directors of Akcea Therapeutics, Inc. from 2019 until the company’s sale in 2020 and Abionyx Pharma from 2018 to 2020, both of which were public biotechnology companies, and Symic Holdings, LLC, a private biotechnology company, from 2015 to 2019.