The Lester Center is pleased to announce the recipients
of the first BioEntrepreneurship Fellowships, a new
program initiated in partnership with the UCSF
Center for BioEntrepreneurship, the Haas MBA student
BioBusiness Association and Three
Arch Partners. The idea for the new fellowship program
was first raised by Dan Brounstein, a first year MBA
student a Haas with extensive experience in the medical
devices industry. The Haas School already had fellowship
programs in place to match MBA students with high tech
start-ups and venture capital firms. But a similar program
for those interested in working with young biotech companies
was missing.
Brounstein approached Bill Harrington of Three Arch
Partners with his idea. Three Arch, with its extensive
portfolio of medical devices and healthcare firms, was
a strong choice. And Harrington was the right person
to help breath life into the concept. With post-doctoral
training at UCSF and an MBA from the Haas School, Harrington
has long been interested in the programs at the two
schools and how they could work together more effectively
to help students launch life sciences companies.
The first two BioEntrepreneurship Fellows are Witney
McKiernan from UCSF and Danel Mayer, who is a first
year MBA. Both will work at Three Arch porfolio companies,
McKiernan at Metrika,
a diabetes monitoring device maker, and Mayer at Kerberos
Proximal Solutions, which is working in cardiovascular
technology.
The Lester Center and UCSF’s Center for BioEntrepreneurship
will jointly manage the new program and look forward
to encouraging other members of the venture community
to participate in the coming years.
