Work with Us

Nikolay Samusik

Co-Founder

Dr. Nikolay Samusik is one of the original co-inventors of the CODEX Technology and is currently a post-doc in the Baxter Laboratories lab at Stanford University, Department of Microbiology and Immunology under the supervision of Dr. Garry Nolan. Nikolay’s research focuses on innovative technology development and computation methods for single cell transcriptomic and protein biomarker analysis. Nikolay is the author of a number of publications and patents in the fields of Immunology and Cancer Biology with particular focus toward advanced single cell methods. Nikolay received his Ph.D. in Computational Systems Biology at MPI-CBG/TU Dresden, and his Bachelors of Science in Biology from the St. Petersburg State University.

Terry Lo

President

Prior to joining Akoya Biosciences, Terry was General Manager of PerkinElmer’s Quantitative Pathology Business Unit. Terry has held leadership positions at Roche Molecular as Business Leader for HPV and Hologic Inc., including Dx GM China, and Dx Head of Japan. Terry also held positions at Bristol-Myers Squibb including Director of Corporate Business Development, Asia. Terry has an MBA from the University of Chicago, an MS from the Virginia Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, and dual BS degrees in Psychology and Molecular Genetics from The Ohio State University.

Yury Goltsev

Scientific Advisory Board & Co-founder

Dr. Yury Goltsev is one of the original co-inventors of the CODEX Technology in the lab of Dr. Garry Nolan at Stanford University. He is currently a Senior Research Scientist focusing on single cell transcriptomic and protein biomarker analysis in the Baxter Laboratories at Stanford in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. Yury is the author of a number of publications and patents in the fields of Immunology and Cancer Biology with particular focus toward advanced single cell methods. Dr. Goltsev earned his Ph.D. in Molecular Immunology in the lab of Dr. David Wallach at the Weizmann Institute of Science and his Masters of Science in Biophysics at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology.

Chris Streck

Vice President of Marketing

Chris joined Akoya in January of 2018. He has over 20 years of product management, sales and marketing experience in the life science industry. Chris has driven the commercialization process from concept through launch, of reagents and instrumentation by partnering with R&D, manufacturing and sales teams. At Illumina, Chris was responsible for the RNA and epigentics products with a focus towards driving adoption of next generation sequencing (NGS) technologies into novel application areas. He has held commercial roles in multiple market-leading companies including Applied Biosystems, 10X Genomics, Illumina and Becton Dickinson.

Matt Winkler

Board Member

Matt joined the Akoya Biosciences Board of Directors in 2017. Matt brings over 25 years’ experience as a founder and executive manager in the life sciences space including the current Chairman and founder of Asuragen, Mirna Therapeutics and Ambion, which was acquired in 2006 by Applied Biosystems, now Thermo Fisher Scientific. In addition to Akoya, he sits on the boards of PhyloTech/Second Genome, The Breakthrough Institute and Revive and Restore. Matt was an Associate Professor in the Department of Zoology at the University of Texas at Austin where he is a member of a number of advisory boards. Dr. Winkler received his Bachelors of Science in genetics and a Ph.D. in Zoology from the University of California at Berkeley.

Gary Nolan

Founder Board Member & Head of the Scientific Advisory Board

Garry co-founded Akoya Biosciences in 2015, and is the Rachford and Carlota A. Harris Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Stanford University School of Medicine. As a co-inventor of the CODEX technology, Garry has focused his research efforts on developing novel technologies and computational methods for research into cancer, leukemia, immunology and autoimmune disease. Dr. Nolan was the founder of a number of life sciences companies in addition to Akoya, including Rigel Inc. (NASDAQ: RIGL) and DVS Sciences and serves as an advisor and board member for several biotechnology companies. He has published over 220 research articles and is the holder of 20 US patents, and has been honored as one of the top 25 inventors at Stanford University. He trained with Leonard Herzenberg (for his Ph.D.) and Nobelist Dr. David Baltimore. He has published over 220 research articles and is the holder of 20 US patents, and has been honored as one of the top 25 inventors at Stanford University. Garry is the first recipient of the Teal Innovator Award (2012) from the Department of Defense and has been honored with a number of awards including Nature Publishing “Outstanding Research Achievement”, Stohlman Scholar from the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and Burroughs Wellcome Fund New Investigator Award.

Thomas Raffin

Board Member

Tom has served on the Akoya Board of Directors since the inception of Akoya Biosciences. Tom spent 24 years on the faculty at Stanford University School of Medicine where he remains the Colleen and Robert Haas Professor Emeritus of Medicine and Biomedical Ethics, former Chief of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, and Co-Founder and Director Emeritus of the Stanford University Center for Biomedical Ethics. Over the past two decades he has worked extensively in the healthcare and medical device sectors and is a co-founder of Rigel Pharmaceuticals. In addition to Akoya, Tom has represented THP on the boards AngioScore (acquired by Spectranetics), Aquaro, Confirma (acquired by Merge), LDR Spine (NASDAQ:LDRH), PneumRx (acquired by BTG Plc), Freedom Innovations (acquired by Health Evolution Partners) and Magstim. He was an observer on the boards of Estech (acquired by AtriCure) and Vidacare (acquired by Teleflex). Tom received a BA from Stanford University and an M.D. from Stanford University School of Medicine and completed his medical residency at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital in Boston.

Robert Shepler

Board Member

Bob has been a corporate transactions specialist and investor since 1978, with a focus on strategic M&A transactions. Bob and Matt Mackowski partnered together in 1991 to form THP’s predecessor focused on investing in private healthcare companies. During his career, he has served on numerous company boards and completed over 200 M&A and financing transactions. In addition to Akoya Biosciences, Bob has represented THP on the boards of Kinetikos Medical (acquired by Integra), AcroMetrix (acquired by Life Technologies), Agena Bioscience, Aurora Discovery (acquired by NEXUS Biosystems), Applied Precision (acquired by GE), Dynex, LDR Spine (NASDAQ:LDRH), Estech (acquired by AtriCure), RareCyte, Sage Labs (acquired by Horizon Discovery) and Vidacare (acquired by Teleflex). He is currently an observer on the boards of Magstim and Precision NanoSystems. Prior to joining with Mr. Mackowski, Bob worked with Merrill Lynch & Co. as an officer in their San Francisco corporate finance office, where he managed financings and acquisitions for Fortune 500 and selected high growth companies. Bob received a BA from Duke University and an MBA from New York University.

Sundiep Phanse, PhD

Vice President of Product Management

Sundiep joined Akoya in April 2019 and brings a wealth of expertise from her prior leadership roles at companies such as Lam Research, Natera, and Thermo Fisher Scientific. She is also a former Bain & Co. consultant and holds a PhD in Chemical Engineering from UC Berkeley.

Brian McKelligon

CEO

Brian joined Akoya Biosciences in July 2017 serving as the CEO, bringing his experience as a 25-year veteran of the life sciences market with a proven track record of building and commercializing products and services for both the research and clinical markets. Most recently, he drove corporate and business development at Cellular Dynamics International (acquired by FUJIFilm) with a focus on the development and partnering of their four cell therapy programs. Prior to that, Brian built and ran commercial organizations at 10X Genomics, Thermo Fisher Scientific / Life Technologies, Affymetrix (IPO, acquired by Thermo Fisher) and Ingenuity Systems (acquired by Qiagen). He came to Thermo Fisher and Life Technologies through their acquisition of Ion Torrent in 2010 where he was an early employee and built the global commercial organization.

Joe Driscoll

CEO

Joe joined Akoya Biosciences in March of 2019 serving as the CFO, bringing over 30 years of financial management experience including all aspects of accounting, finance, M&A and international operations. Most recently, he served as the CFO of Quanterix where he guided the company through a successful IPO and served as the primary contact with the investment community. This role was preceded by CFO and other leadership positions at a number of private and publicly traded companies in various industries, including healthcare and technology.

Julia Kennedy-Darling

Director of Research & Development

Dr. Julia Kennedy-Darling joined Akoya in March of 2017 to lead development efforts for the CODEX technology. Prior to joining Akoya, Julia was a co-inventor of the CODEX technology while a Cancer Research Institute Irvington Postdoctoral Fellow in Professor Garry Nolan’s lab at Stanford University School of Medicine. She received her Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Wisconsin-Madison under the supervision of Professor Lloyd Smith and received both her M.S. and B.S. in chemistry from the University of Chicago. Dr. Kennedy-Darling has experience in multiplexed DNA technologies and is an author on a number of peer-reviewed papers.

Cliff Hoyt

Vice President, Translational & Scientific Affairs

Prior to joining Akoya Biosciences, Cliff was Director of Applications and Services for PerkinElmer’s Quantitative Pathology Business Unit. Cliff was co-founder and CTO of CRI, Inc., acquired by PerkinElmer in 2011. Since then, as Oncology Fellow, Cliff lead development of multiplexed staining methods (Opal), built the contract research business, partnered with pharma and academia to understand translational research and clinical needs and to advance adoption of multiplexed immunofluorescence methods, and worked with PKI business leaders to develop an oncology translational strategy. Cliff has been Principal Investigator on NIH SBIR grants, received his BA in Physics from Williams College in 1983 and MS in Mechanical Engineering from MIT in 1987, and is named inventor on over 20 patents.

Peter Miller

Vice President of Research & Development, Phenoptics

Prior to joining Akoya Biosciences, Peter was Director of R&D for PerkinElmer’s Quantitative Pathology Business Unit. Peter was a co-founder of CRI, Inc., where he was responsible for product development, technology assessment, licensing, and intellectual property management. He has been a Principal Investigator on NSF, NASA, and Air Force grants; is a named inventor on more than 25 US patents, and sat on the OSA’s Richardson Medal committee. He holds a BS from Williams College in Physics & Astronomy, and an MS from Dartmouth’s Thayer School.

Seth Benson

Vice President of Business Operations

Seth joined Akoya Biosciences in December of 2018 as Vice President of Business Operations. He has over 15 years of experience in finance, strategy, and operations having recently held several positions at Ameritox where he was the General Manager of Ingenuity Health, Head of Strategic Initiatives and a member of the Sterling Partners Accelerator Program for finance and strategy professionals. Previously, Seth spent several years working in the healthcare investment banking divisions of Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley where he advised clients in acquisitions, capital raises and capital structure. He began his career in consulting at Accenture and Diamond Management and Technology Partners (now PWC). Seth received his BS in Biology from Duke University and MBA from Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management.

Paul Grass

Vice President of Sales

Paul joined Akoya in January of 2018 as the head of sales. He has over 20 years of experience in customer support, marketing, and sales leadership roles. Paul has most recently led large commercial sales teams at both Thermo Fisher Scientific and Bio-Rad Laboratories focused in both the Life Science and Clinical industry respectively. Paul holds a B.S. in Biochemistry from Seattle Pacific University.

Nadiya Nikulina

Senior Research Associate

Nadya was the first employee of Akoya Biosciences in July 2016 and has passionately dedicated to the development of the CODEX system to advance innovation, driven by her passion for developing a deeper understanding of biological processes, ultimately leading to improved treatments and therapies. Prior to Akoya, she conducted clinical research at Diagnostic BioSystems and the Center of New Diagnostic Technologies, Medical Laboratory. Nadya has completed a dual Master of Science program in Biochemistry with a specialization in Immunology and Masters in Biology with a focus on Cell Biology at the UDSU in Izhevsk, Russia.

Tom Schnettler

Board Member

Tom Schnettler is vice chairman of Piper Sandler Companies, a managing director in the merchant banking group and co-CEO of PSC Capital Partners LLC, the registered investment adviser to the Piper Sandler merchant banking funds. Schnettler has held a number of leadership roles at Piper Sandler, including president and chief operating officer and chief financial officer. Earlier in his career, he cofounded and led the healthcare investment banking group.
Schnettler has served on the board of, or held board observation responsibility for, Akoya Biosciences, Torax Medical, Sapphire Digital, Sport Ngin, Xenex Disinfection Services and Elligo Health Research.
Schnettler graduated from Saint John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota and holds a Juris doctorate from Harvard Law School.