Douglas Hamilton

Worth knowing

He has raised the kinds of capital small biotechs struggle with, from a US $2.8 million Department of Defense grant for a lung injury program to a $45.2 million merger with Cell Therapeutics, and he has served as both CEO and CFO of clinical-stage companies. Canadian biotech founders weighing a US financing, a strategic merger or a first non-dilutive grant should get in touch.

Story

Douglas studied medical genetics at the University of Toronto and took an MBA at Ivey, then spent his early career on the finance side of drug development, as CFO and business development lead at PolaRx and later CFO and COO of Javelin Pharmaceuticals through seven years of building. From 2015 he ran MetaStat in Boston, a personalized medicine company working on aggressive cancer. In 2018 he came back to Toronto as President and CEO of Vasomune Therapeutics, where he built out the clinical and scientific advisory board and took AV-001 into development for acute lung injury and ARDS, including COVID-19. He is now in San Mateo leading NeuraViva.

Highlights

• Co-led $45.2M merger with Cell Therapeutics; helped develop orphan drug Trisenox
• CFO and COO, Javelin Pharmaceuticals (1999-2006)
• Principal, New Biology Ventures LLC
• B.Sc. Medical Genetics, University of Toronto; MBA, Ivey Business School
• 30+ years as a biotechnology and pharmaceutical executive