Board

Dr. Alexander Ehlgen
Alexander is an investment manager of the Boehringer Ingelheim Venture Fund and currently serves as a board member of Tacalyx GmbH and AIgnostics GmbH.
Alexander joined Boehringer Ingelheim in 2012 in Translational Medicine and in 2014 was appointed Global Head of the Translational Medicine and Biomarker Experts group responsible for translational medicine and biomarker aspects of novel pharmaceutical compounds. Prior to joining Boehringer Ingelheim, he worked at a biotech start-up in California and a major US pharmaceutical company in a variety of roles in clinical drug development. His focus was on novel drugs and imaging tracers in the cardiovascular and metabolic diseases areas. He also conducted academic research on myocardial perfusion and stress echocardiography at the University of Oxford, UK. Alexander is a physician, who received his medical degree from the University of Bonn, Germany.

Dr. Frank Hensel
Frank holds a PH.D. in biology from the University of Würzburg. After his Post-Doc-position he became CEO and Co-Founder of the start-up company OncoMab GmbH developing natural human monoclonal antibodies for cancer treatment. Frank led different partnering activities and participated in the development of the lead antibody into the clinic. After the Merger of OncoMab with a US-based company the joint company Patrys Ltd. went public at the Australian Stock Exchange in 2007.
Since being part of HTGF in 2015 Frank built a solid portfolio of start-ups with a focus on drug development companies. Out of this portfolio four companies already entered the clinical stage and one company, Amal Therapeutics, was successfully exited to Boehringer Ingelheim with a deal volume of up to € 425m.

Ulrich Mahr
As member of the General Management of Max-Planck-Innovation GmbH Ulrich oversees the technology transfer office´s spin-off activities and portfolio management. He advised and supported numerous start-up companies and served as chairman, member or observer on several advisory or supervisory boards. Ulrich took a leading role in establishing and financing several incubators and served as board member of ASTP, the European technology transfer association. He is jury member for the pre-seed grant scheme “EXIST Forschungstransfer“, member of the investment board for the regional venture fund “Wachstumsfonds Bayern“ and member of the advisory board of two start-up incubators. Following his diploma in business economics (Ludwig Maximilians University Munich) he initially worked for a leading IT distributor where he oversaw the Hewlett-Packard product portfolio with sales over €130m.

Dr. Peter Neubeck
Peter is a Medical Doctor, educated at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich as well as Harvard Medical School and holds an MBA from INSEAD. After tenures at Großhadern University Clinic, Cleveland Clinic, and Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital followed by McKinsey & Company and several leadership positions at Novartis, he entered the Venture Capital industry. He took on responsibilities as an Investment Manager and collected valuable operational experience in various executive roles in company creations. Since January 2019 he heads the investment business of Kurma Partners in Germany.

Tim Brans
At coparion Tim is responsible for the life science portfolio management. He serves as board member and observer in several oncology startups such as Abalos, CatalYm and Tacalyx. Furthermore he represents coparion in four portfolio companies. Besides that Tim is part of the finance department at coparion where he is responsible for the controlling and portfolio valuation. He holds a Bachelor’s degree in business administration from university Duisburg-Essen and worked several years for one of the biggest audit and consulting companies before joining coparion.

Karlheinz Schmelig
Karlheinz is a Managing Partner at Creathor Ventures focusing on life sciences and healthtech investments. He has a broad background in private equity and venture capital and has been working in the industry for nearly 20 years.
Before joining Creathor, Karlheinz worked as an investment director at 3i Group plc and before that as an investment manager at the Technologieholding VC GmbH. Prior to his venture capital career Karlheinz worked successfully for over ten years in a number of global management positions in the healthcare industry. He spent seven of these years in the US at Boehringer Mannheim and F. Hoffmann-La Roche, where he worked in global business development and marketing roles.
Karlheinz studied business in Mannheim and received a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from the Kelly School of Business at Indiana University. He is also a member of the Beta Gamma Sigma Honor Society for Business Administration and a Certified Production Inventory Manager (CPIM) with the American Production and Inventory Control Society (APICS). He currently serves as an advisory board member for the “GO BIO Gründerinitiative” of the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and is a member of the Venture Council of Invest Europe.

Dr. Klaus Schollmeier
Klaus is an advisor to the Pharma/Biotech industry and member of the board/chairman of several Biotech companies including Anergis Pharma (Switzerland), Affiris Pharma (Austria) and Eternygen (Germany). He also advises and mentors a number of start-up companies in Europe as entrepreneur in residence and business angel. Klaus was Chief Executive Officer of SuppreMol (Germany) from 2013 until 2015, when the company was sold to Baxter. Prior to that, he served as CEO of Santhera (Switzerland), from 2004 to 2011 and chairman of the board of Santhera until 2013. Klaus joined Graffinity Pharmaceuticals AG (Germany) as CEO in 2003 and merged the company with MyoContract AG (Switzerland) in 2004 to form Santhera. Before joining the biotechnology industry in 2003, he served as managing director of the healthcare/biotechnology group at ING-BHF Bank for ING Group Europe. Prior to that, he spent 16 years in the pharmaceutical industry at BASF, Knoll and Abbott. His scientific responsibilities included head of oncology/immunology research at BASF’s central laboratories in Ludwigshafen, Germany, and senior director of biotechnology at BASF Bioresearch Corporation in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA (from 1989 to 1993). His business functions included general manager of BASF Pharma Netherlands from 1996 to 1998 and vice president and general manager for Western Europe thereafter. From 1994 to 1995, he led BASF’s acquisition and integration of Boots Pharmaceuticals.
Klaus holds a PhD in biology from the University of Düsseldorf (Germany) and in 1991 he became an adjunct research associate professor at the Boston University Medical School, Massachusetts.

Prof. Dr. Peter Seeberger
Peter is cofounder and member of the board of Tacalyx. He is director at the Max-Planck Institute for Colloids and Surfaces in Potsdam. His research focus is on the chemistry and biology of carbohydrates ranging from synthesis to immunology and he has a long track record of translating cutting-edge basic research into products. His research has been documented in more than 500 journal articles, more than 50 patents and has been recognized by more than 40 international awards.

peter-seeberger.de