David Mott

David Mott has served as Chair of our Board of Directors since July 2012. Mr. Mott is a private investor through Mott Family Capital. From September 2008 until his retirement in February 2020, Mr. Mott served as a general partner of New Enterprise Associates, an investment firm focused on venture capital and growth equity investments, where he led the healthcare investing practice. From 1992 until 2008, Mr. Mott worked at MedImmune Limited, a biotechnology company and subsidiary of AstraZeneca Plc, and served in numerous roles during his tenure including from October 2000 to July 2008 as president and chief executive officer, and previously as chief financial officer, and as president and chief operating officer. During that time, Mr. Mott also served as executive vice president of AstraZeneca Plc from June 2007 to July 2008 following AstraZeneca Plc’s acquisition of MedImmune Limited in June 2007. Prior to joining MedImmune Limited, Mr. Mott was a vice president in the healthcare investment banking group at Smith Barney, Harris Upham & Co. Inc.

Mr. Mott received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Dartmouth College. Mr. Mott serves as the chairman of the board of directors for Adaptimmune Therapeutics plc, Ardelyx, Inc., Epizyme, Inc. and Imara Inc, and he serves as a member of the board of Novavax, Inc. He previously served as chairman of the board of directors of TESARO, Inc., until its sale, and he previously served as a member of the board of directors of Nightstar Therapeutics, plc., until its sale.

Lawrence Alleva

Lawrence M. Alleva has served as a member of our Board of Directors since September 2017. Prior to his retirement in June 2010, Mr. Alleva was employed by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP for 39 years, including 28 years as a partner. Mr. Alleva served clients primarily in the technology sector, as well as pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. Additionally, he served in a variety of office and regional practice leadership roles, most recently as ethics and compliance leader (assurance) for PwC from 2006 until his retirement. Mr. Alleva is a Certified Public Accountant (inactive).

Mr. Alleva received a Bachelor of Science degree in accounting from Ithaca College and attended the Columbia University Executive MBA (non-degree) Program. Mr. Alleva also serves as a director for Bright Horizons Family Solutions Inc., Galera Therapeutics Inc. and Adaptimmune Therapeutics plc. He previously served as a director of TESARO, Inc., Mirna Therapeutics, Inc., and GlobalLogic, Inc., and chaired the audit committee for each of those companies.

Willard H. Dere, MD

Willard H. Dere, M.D., has served as a member of our Board of Directors since March 2018.Since November 2014, Dr. Dere has served as Professor of Internal Medicine, B. Lue and Hope S. Bettilyon Presidential Endowed Chair in Internal Medicine for Diabetes Research, Executive Director of Personalized Health and Co-Principal Investigator of the Center for Clinical and Translational Science at the University of Utah Health Sciences Center. Prior to that, he served at Amgen Inc., a biopharmaceutical company, as Senior Vice President, Global Development, from December 2004 to June 2007, and from April 2014 to October 2014, and as International Chief Medical Officer from January 2007 to April 2014. Before he joined Amgen in 2003, Dr. Dere served as Vice President of Endocrine, Bone and General Medicine Research and Development at Eli Lilly and Company, a biopharmaceutical company, where he also held various other roles in clinical pharmacology, regulatory affairs, and both early-stage translational, and late-stage clinical research.

Dr. Dere earned his undergraduate and medical degrees at the University of California, Davis, completed his internal medicine residency training at the University of Utah, and completed his postdoctoral training in endocrinology and metabolism at the University of California, San Francisco. Dr. Dere serves on the board of directors of each of Radius Health, Inc., BioMarin Pharmaceutical Inc., Metagenomi, Inc. and Seres Therapeutics, Inc.

Allene M. Diaz

Allene M. Diaz has served as a member of our Board of Directors since March 2021. Since August 2020, she has led AMD Consulting, a new product strategy and portfolio management consulting practice. Ms. Diaz held the position of Senior Vice President of R&D Portfolio Management at GlaxoSmithKline from September 2019 to June 2020. From May 2015 to September 2019, she served as the Senior Vice President of Global Commercial Development and Program Strategy and as a member of the Executive Leadership Team at TESARO. She was integrally involved in the acquisition of TESARO by GlaxoSmithKline in January 2019.

Prior to joining TESARO in 2015, Ms. Diaz held a variety of leadership roles in the EMD Serono and Merck Serono divisions of Merck KGaA, including Senior Vice President, Managed Markets, Senior Vice President, Head of U.S. Oncology Commercial, Vice President, Oncology Marketing, Head of Oncology Global Strategic Planning and Head of the Global Oncology Business Unit. Earlier in her career, Ms. Diaz held management, operating, sales and medical affairs roles at various biopharmaceutical companies, including Pfizer, Biogen and Amylin Pharmaceuticals among others.

Ms. Diaz has been a member of the Board of Directors of Allena Pharmaceuticals since April 2019 and a member of the Board of Directors of BCLS Acquisition Corp. since August 2020.  Ms. Diaz previously served on the board of directors of Erytech Pharma SA, a biopharmaceutical company developing innovative therapies for cancer, from September 2016 to September 2019.  Ms. Diaz earned a B.S. in Psychology from Florida State University. Ms. Diaz serves on the board of directors of Ionis Pharameucticals, Inc.

Andrew Hack MD, PhD

Andrew A. F. Hack, M.D., Ph.D., has served as a member of our Board of Directors since January 2017. Since March 2019, Dr. Hack has served as a Managing Director of Bain Capital Life Sciences, a private equity fund that invests in biopharmaceutical, specialty pharmaceutical, medical device, diagnostics, and enabling life science technology companies globally. Before joining Bain Capital, Dr. Hack was the Chief Financial Officer of Editas Medicine from July 2015 through March 2019. Previously, Dr. Hack served as a portfolio manager at Millennium Management, where he ran a healthcare hedge fund focused on biotechnology, pharmaceutical and medical device companies from May 2011 to June 2015. Prior to Millennium, Andrew was an analyst at HealthCor Management from December 2008 to May 2011. Prior to HealthCor Management, Dr. Hack was an analyst at Carlyle-Blue Wave Partners and a principal of the MPM BioEquities Fund. He started his investment career as an equity research analyst covering the biotechnology sector at Banc of America Securities after serving as Director of Life Sciences at Reify Corporation, a life science tools and drug discovery company.

In addition, Dr. Hack has been a member of the Board of Directors of Allena Pharmaceuticals since June 2018, and serves as the Chair of its Audit Committee, and has been a member of the Board of Directors of Dynavax Technologies since August 2019, and serves as a member of its Audit Committee. Dr. Hack received his B.A. in biology with special honors from the University of Chicago, where he also received his M.D. and Ph.D. and was named the inaugural Frank Family Scholar.

Kristen M. Hege, MD

Kristen Hege, M.D., has served as a member of our Board of Directors since August 2016. Dr. Hege joined Celgene Corporation in 2010 as Vice President, Translational Development and is currently Senior Vice President, Early Clinical Development, Hematology/Oncology & Cell Therapy at Bristol Myers Squibb Company (following its acquisition of Celgene in 2019). She has also held an active faculty position at the University of California, San Francisco Medical Center since 1996, most recently as Clinical Professor of Medicine, Hematology/Oncology, serving in that role as a volunteer since 2008. Prior to Celgene, she served as Chief Medical Officer at Cellerant Therapeutics and Acting Chief Medical Officer at Aragon Pharmaceuticals and Theraclone Sciences. Dr. Hege was also a Vice President, Clinical Research and Development at Cell Genesys. Dr. Hege previously served as a volunteer-at-large director for the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer from 2016 to 2019 and the BayBio/California Life Sciences Association from 2014 to 2016. She also previously served as a member of the board of directors at Arcus Biosciences from 2018 to 2019 and as a board observer for Flexus Biosciences from 2014 to 2015.

Dr. Hege received a B.A. in Biochemistry from Dartmouth College summa cum laude, an M.D. from University of California, San Francisco, Internal Medicine training at Harvard’s Brigham & Women’s Hospital, and Board certification in Hematology and Medical Oncology from the University of California, San Francisco.

Martin Huber, MD

Martin Huber, M.D., has served as a member of our Board of Directors since April 2020. Since April 2020, he has served as the Chief Medical Officer of Xilio Therapeutics, Inc.  Prior to Xilio, he previously served as Senior Vice President, Chief Medical Officer at TESARO, Inc., from September 2015 to January 2019, and after TESARO’s acquisition by GlaxoSmithKline plc, he served as Senior Vice President, Clinical, from January 2019 to April 2020. While at TESARO, he drove the expansion of the niraparib program and oversaw the company’s clinical testing of its immune-oncology agents. Prior to TESARO, Dr. Huber served as Vice President, Oncology Clinical Research at Merck Research Laboratories from 2012 to 2015. Prior to Merck, he served in roles of increasing responsibility at Schering-Plough, Hoffmann-La Roche and Rhone-Poulenc Rorer, where he led teams in the areas of oncology clinical development, drug safety and pharmacovigilance. He was previously an Assistant Professor of Oncology at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. Dr. Huber received his medical degree from Baylor College of Medicine.

Anna Protopapas

Anna Protopapas has served as our President and Chief Executive Officer and as a director since March 2015. Prior to joining Mersana, from October 2010 to October 2014, Ms. Protopapas served as a member of the Executive Committee of Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited, a global pharmaceutical company, and held various senior management positions at the company, including serving as President of Millennium Pharmaceuticals, a wholly owned subsidiary of Takeda focused on oncology, where she was responsible for leading the oncology business, and Executive Vice President of Global Business Development, where she was responsible for global acquisitions, partnering, licensing and venture investing. From October 1997 to October 2010, Ms. Protopapas served in various positions at Millennium Pharmaceuticals, including as the Senior Vice President of Strategy and Business Development and a member of the Executive Committee, where she led the company’s business development initiatives.

Ms. Protopapas currently serves on the board of directors and the compensation committee for Dicerna Pharmaceuticals, Inc., since her appointment in January 2019. Ms. Protopapas served on the board of directors of Bioverativ from February 2017 until its sale. Previously, she served on the board of directors for Ariad Pharmaceuticals from May 2015 until the sale of the company in January 2017 and served as the Chair of the Compensation Committee beginning in February 2016. She received a bachelor’s degree in science and engineering from Princeton University, a master’s in chemical engineering practice from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and an M.B.A. from Stanford Graduate School of Business.