Leadership

Dr. Guo-Liang Yu is a leader in the Chinese and global biopharmaceutical communities as well as an accomplished scientist and serial entrepreneur. His many leadership roles include currently serving as the Chairman and CEO of Apollomics, an innovative US and China-based biopharmaceutical company committed to the discovery and development of oncology combination therapies. In recent years he has also been Executive Chairman of Crown Bioscience Inc. which he successfully sold to JSR Corporation, and served as a Venture Partner at OrbiMed, a premier global venture capital firm. Dr. Yu has also personally helped start several companies where he has served in a board and/or advisory role. Earlier in his career, Dr. Yu co-founded Epitomics Inc., an antibody-based biotechnology company where he served as CEO for 10 years prior the company being acquired by Abcam. Dr. Yu is the founding president of the Chinese Biopharmaceutical Association and serves on the boards of BayHelix, CABS, National Foundation of Cancer Research, Ray Wu Memorial Foundation, and University of the Pacific. Dr. Yu’s success is driven by his scientific curiosity and a passion for translating scientific discovery into real products. His challenge is balancing his time between science and business, fun and work, family and community.

Dr. Yuling Li is a seasoned and well-respected biopharmaceutical professional who has led successful product development from clinical stage through commercialization. Prior to joining Innoforce, Dr. Li was a R&D Director and Fellow at MedImmune/AstraZeneca. She started her career at Roche and later worked at Human Genome Sciences (now GlaxoSmithKline) where she held several leadership roles including Director of Purification Sciences. While serving in these positions, Dr. Li played a key role in the development of 3 approved products and contributed to over 30 clinical development programs. Additionally, she has authored over 40 publications and is the primary inventor for five issued patents.  She is a well-recognized and frequently invited speaker and advisor, and was recognized for her professional accomplishments with the prestigious Rising Star Award from the Healthcare Businesswomen’s Association. Dr. Li is also active in several industry organizations, having served as the President of the Chinese Biopharmaceutical Association and co-founding the Alliance of ALL-CABPA. She is also passionate about mentoring mid-stage biotech professionals, developing the next generation of women in leadership, and supporting the growth of young scientists. In her spare time, Dr. Li enjoys reading, sightseeing, meditation, and yoga.

Dr. Kenneth Carter is a dynamic biotechnology industry executive and scientific leader with deep experience in early-stage company development. He has been involved in starting and guiding several biotechnology companies as a co-founder, advisor, CEO, and/or member of the Board of Directors including NexImmune (NASDAQ: NEXI) which he co-founded and served for many years as Chairman and CEO, and Seneca Biopharma (NASDAQ: SNCA) where he served as Executive Chairman. From 1999 until 2009, Dr. Carter was a co-founder and the CEO of Avalon Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: AVRX, now part of AbbVie). Under his leadership, Avalon developed a pipeline of cancer drug candidates based on a novel high-throughput genomic screening technology, and completed an IPO and multiple partnerships with top 10 pharmaceutical companies. Earlier in his career, Dr. Carter was head of gene mapping at Human Genome Sciences, Inc. where he was involved in the discovery of dozens of novel human proteins with therapeutic or diagnostic potential, particularly for the treatment of cancer. Dr. Carter is also engaged in a range of educational and teaching activities and holds an adjunct faculty position at Johns Hopkins University, where he teaches a course titled “Creating a Biotechnology Enterprise”.

Dr. Min Zhu is a well-respected professional in the biopharmaceutical industry, with over 17 years of experience in process development, characterization, and validation support. Prior to joining Innoforce, Dr. Zhu served as Director of Protein Science at Boehringer Ingelheim in Fremont. At BI, she was responsible for CMC strategy and cross-functional alignment from process characterization to BLA submission. In addition, she led the technology development and implementation of a next-generation continuous manufacturing platform. Before that, Dr. Zhu led downstream commercial process development, process characterization and validation for several late-stage biologic pipeline products at MedImmune/AstraZeneca. Dr. Zhu has published more than twenty papers in peer-reviewed journals and is a frequent speaker in international biopharmaceutical conferences. In addition to her leadership in the biopharmaceutical community, Dr. Zhu is also passionate about photography and traveling.

Dr. Yingfei Wei is a world-class scientist and an experienced executive in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry, with experience in both large and small companies at various stages of development. Among other notable accomplishments during her career, Dr. Wei served as the Chief Scientific Officer for 3SBio, Inc., where she helped lead the IPO for 3SBio which was the first NASDAQ-listed Chinese biopharmaceutical company. Prior to 3SBio, Dr. Wei served as Director of Cell and Analytical Biology of the Bayer Biotech Research Division. Earlier in her career, Dr. Wei was a principal scientist at Human Genome Sciences where she played a key role in discovery of the HPNCC gene for colorectal cancer, which was named as the Science “Molecule of the Year” in 1994. She completed her postdoctoral training at Harvard School of Public Health, where her research focused on DNA damage repair. Dr. Wei is actively involved in biopharmaceutical-related associations including CABS, CBA, and BayHelix. She is also an advocate and participant in developing programs for rural early-childhood education in rural China.