Renée JG Arnold, John Reinhart, Don Rose, and Kwame Ulmer join Diverse Entrepreneurs-in-Residence (EIR) Team
ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND, February 8, 2021 – BioHealth Innovation Inc., (BHI), announces the addition of Renée JG Arnold, PharmD, RPh, President & CEO, Arnold Consultancy & Technology, LLC, John P. Reinhart, CPA, MBA, Co-founder and Board Member of the Thrive Center in Louisville, Kentucky, Don Rose, Ph.D., Special Advisor to Hatteras Venture Partners, and Kwame Ulmer, Principal at Ulmer Ventures to the growing Entrepreneurs-in-Residence (EIR) team. The Entrepreneur-in-Residence Program at BHI aims to ensure that disruptive technologies receive all the resources required to transform the technology from a discovery into a commercially relevant product and eventually have a measurable impact on human health. The program was created to support scientists, early-stage startups, and licensed technologies to provide them with access to these resources. These four additions to the team will be working with the National Institutes of Health (NIH), specifically the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), and the National Institute on Aging (NIH).
“I am honored to welcome Renée, John, Don, and Kwame to our EIR Program,” said Richard Bendis, BHI President, and CEO. “Our relationship with NIH is very important and these four immensely talented individuals will help us support our commitment to the NIH and the Biohealth Capital Region.”
Renée JG Arnold, PharmD, RPh (NILBI) is currently President & CEO, Arnold Consultancy & Technology, LLC, where she oversees outcomes research and develops affiliated software for pharmaceutical and government programs. Her special interest in evidence-based health derives from her research that deals with using technology to collect and/or model real-world data for use in rational decision-making by healthcare practitioners and policymakers. She is also an Adjunct Professor, Master of Public Health program, Department of Environmental Medicine and Public Health at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, New York, where she has developed and teaches the pharmacoeconomics coursework.
Dr. Arnold completed her undergraduate training at the University of Maryland and received her Doctor of Pharmacy degree from the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. She also completed a post-doctoral residency at University Hospital in San Diego/the University of California at San Francisco School of Pharmacy. Dr. Arnold is a founding member of the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research (ISPOR) and is the Chair of multiple special interest groups (SIGS) there, including, most recently, the Open Source Model SIG. Dr. Arnold is an author of numerous articles, book chapters, and books in the areas of pharmacology, pharmacoeconomics, and cost containment strategies and recently published the 2nd edition of her pharmacoeconomics textbook.
John P. Reinhart CPA, MBA, (NIA) (John will be joing the team later in February 2021) is a C-suite executive and serial entrepreneur specializing in Longevity Economic innovation. He is a co-founder and board member of the Thrive Center in Louisville, Kentucky (www.thrivecenterky.org), a not-for-profit innovation center that brings together consumers, entrepreneurs, researchers, investors, providers, and distributors to explore solutions that enhance both the quality of life and care for a global aging population. John currently serves as president of CNAonline (www.cnaonline.com), a platform technology company that partners with the American Health Care Association (AHCA) to deliver certified pre-licensure CNA training in a hybrid online model to address the workforce shortage by making training more accessible. He is also a co-founder and manager of Wellness Ventures (www.extractwellness.com), a brand company focused on CBD-infused products. John has co-founded three-sector commercialization ventures. He has held executive roles, including the CEO of a nurse practitioner medical group, chief innovation officer of a multistate long term care provider, and as president of an electronic health records software venture acquired by a NASDAQ company.
John has been receiving recognition for his contributions in the healthcare arena for nearly twenty years. He is the recipient of several prestigious awards, including Louisville Business First’s “2020 Healthcare Hero”. This award honors an entrepreneurial initiative in the health care business scene that is making strides in the industry and Ernst & Young “Entrepreneur of the Year” (2004), an elite award presented to business leaders who have been recognized for their exceptional entrepreneurial achievements.
He has a B.S. in Accounting from the University of Kentucky and is a licensed Certified Public Accountant. John holds an MBA in Healthcare Sector Management and Policy from the University of Miami in Florida.
John has Co-Authored Chapters of Books in Population Health – Policy, Management, Technology – Chapter 9: Developments in Population Health for an Aging Population (2014) and Accountable Care: Bridging the Health Information Technology Divide – Chapter 11: The New Horizon-A Network Transition to Individual & Population Health (2012). He is a sought-after speaker with recent engagements with Mary Furlong & Associates events, Lincoln Healthcare LTC 100, Lockton Longevity Economy Seminar, Leading Age PEAK, Moderator American Health Care Association Multi-Site CEO Meeting, and American Society of Health Care Administration Executives, to name a few. Also, he is frequently published in industry journals.
Don Rose, Ph.D., (NIA) is a Special Advisor to Hatteras Venture Partners. He has extensive experience in launching and building life science startups, most recently as Director of the University of North Carolina’s KickStart program. At UNC, he helped spin out 80 companies that have raised over $500M. While at UNC, he published Research to Revenue: A Practical Guide to University Start-ups (UNC Press, 2016)). In addition, he’s a Professor of the Practice at UNC’s Kenan-Flagler Business School, teaching entrepreneurship. Before UNC, he held senior leadership roles at several life sciences startups: Metabolon (metabolomics), Deerac Fluidics (nanoliter dispensing), and DataCentric Automation (high-throughput crystallography). Before that, he was a partner with Catalysta Partners (now Hatteras Venture Partners), where he co-founded Phase Bioscience (NASDAQ: PHAS).
Before Catalysta, he was co-founder and VP of Research and Development at Cartesian Technologies, a leader in instrumentation for DNA microarrays and nanoliter dispensing. Prior to Cartesian, Dr. Rose was a research scientist at Glaxo Wellcome (now GSK), where he developed and promoted many technologies in bioanalytical chemistry, combinatorial chemistry, and high-throughput screening. Before GW, Dr. Rose developed various aspects of capillary electrophoreses instrumentation at Hewlett-Packard Laboratories. Dr. Rose received his Ph.D. in Analytical Chemistry and BS in Nutrition from the University of North Carolina. He holds six US patents and has published eight papers and two book chapters.
Kwame Ulmer (NHLBI) brings nearly twenty years of experience evaluating medical technologies in the government and serving in senior operating roles at medical device companies. Mr. Ulmer previously served as Vice President, Regulatory Affairs and Quality Assurance at Implant Direct, a Danaher Corporation operating company. Kwame has served in progressive leadership roles at the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and personally evaluated over 1,000 medical technologies.
Mr. Ulmer is also a Venture Partner at Wavemaker Three-Sixty Health – the leading Southern-California based, early-stage venture capital firm (Seed and Series A) focused on the healthcare industry, member of Tech Coast Angels (LA), the world’s largest angel investing network, and a member of the steering committee for ScaleHealth, the leading healthcare innovation space in Los Angeles. Kwame earned his B.S. in Physics from Lincoln University (Pennsylvania) and both an M.S. in Materials Engineering and an M.B.A. from the University of Virginia.
About BioHealth Innovation, Inc.
BioHealth Innovation, Inc. (BHI) is a public-private nonprofit organization focused on accelerating biohealth (therapeutic, diagnostic, medtech, and health IT) commercialization in the BioHealth Capital Region (Maryland, DC, and Virginia). BHI’s team of expert Entrepreneurs-in-Residence, in-house venture analysts, and other professional staff work in the region to:
- Facilitate technology commercialization,
- Raise the profile of the industry cluster and individual organizations,
- Increase access to capital for early-stage and growing companies, and
- Expand the pool of talent with commercially relevant experience.
BHI’s early-stage company support includes market research and commercialization plan development, non-dilutive funding application assistance; a jobs board; event calendar; and introductions to investors, strategic partners, business advisors, and potential clients. BHI also manages wet lab space and provides referrals to other space for early-stage companies, offers soft-landing support for international companies, and works with partners to co-host the annual BioHealth Capital Region Forum and an annual BioHealth Capital Region investor partnering conference. For more information: www.BioHealthInnovation.org
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Media contacts:
Rich Bendis
Phone: 301-637-6439, email: rbendis@biohealthinnovation.org