AmirAli Talasaz | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1978, 1979  |
| Education | Doctor of Philosophy |
| Alma mater | |
| Occupation | Entrepreneur, chief executive officer, electrical engineer, researcher, chairperson |
| Employer |
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AmirAli Talasaz is an entrepreneur in the field of clinical diagnostics. He founded the startup Auriphex Biosciences and is co-founder and co-chief executive officer of Guardant Health.
Talasaz studied electrical engineering at Sharif University in Tehran and later attended Stanford University from 2001 to 2007, where he earned a Doctor of Philosophy degree. Prior to attending Stanford, he was introduced to Ronald W. Davis of the university's Genome Technology Center by Mostafa Ronaghi, who later became chief technology officer at Illumina, Inc. [1]
Talasaz is an electrical engineer and researcher. [1] [2] Leena Rao of TechCrunch has described him as a "serial" entrepreneur in the fields of clinical research and sample preparation. [3] Talasaz worked at the Genome Technology Center until 2009, when he founded Auriphex Biosciences, which developed methods for isolating cancer cells from blood. [1] He also worked for Illumina from March 2009 to June 2012. [4]
In 2012-2013, Talasaz and Helmy Eltoukhy co-founded Guardant Health, which develops technology to detect and diagnose cancer via blood tests, [5] during 2012–2013. [6] [7] The duo met at Stanford in 2002 and worked together at Illumina, until Talasaz left in 2012. [8] According to John Dorfman of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review , Talasaz and Eltoukhy discovered a liquid biopsy technique which "involves detecting and monitoring tumor fragments circulating in the patient's bloodstream", as an alternative to traditional tissue biopsies. [9] Talasaz was first the president and chief technology officer of Guardant Health. [10] [11] He held the president, chief financial officer, and chief operating officer positions in 2019, when he and Eltoukhy collectively held 12 percent of Guardant Health's stock. [12] [13] In 2021, both spent $10 million to purchase additional shares of the company. [9] Talasaz and Eltoukhy are now co-chief executive officers. [6]
In 2022, Illumina sued Guardant Health and its co-founders in Delaware federal court over trade secrets. Illumina accused the duo of incorporating Guardant Health anonymously in 2011, while working at Illumina and stealing confidential documents related to DNA sequencing technology to acquire 35 patents. [8] In response, Guardant Health rejected the claims, accused Illumina of attempting to eliminate competitors, and asked for a suit dismissal. [14] [15] In 2023, the two companies settled, signed a long-term supply agreement, and agreed to share specimen samples for cancer research. [16]
Talasaz has served on Guardant Health's board of directors since January 2013, occupying the chairman role until August 2021. [17] He also serves on the board of uLab Systems, [18] and is a founding member of the World Innovations Network. [19]
In 2017, Talasaz and Eltoukhy ranked number 37 in Fortune magazine's "40 Under 40" list. [20] The duo were also included in Time magazine's 2018 "Health Care 50" list, which recognizes people for transforming health care. [21]
Jerry Chih-Yuan Yang is an American billionaire computer programmer, internet entrepreneur, and venture capitalist. He is the co-founder and former CEO of Yahoo! Inc. and founding partner of AME Cloud Ventures.
A biopsy is a medical test commonly performed by a surgeon, an interventional radiologist, or an interventional cardiologist. The process involves the extraction of sample cells or tissues for examination to determine the presence or extent of a disease. The tissue is then fixed, dehydrated, embedded, sectioned, stained and mounted before it is generally examined under a microscope by a pathologist; it may also be analyzed chemically. When an entire lump or suspicious area is removed, the procedure is called an excisional biopsy. An incisional biopsy or core biopsy samples a portion of the abnormal tissue without attempting to remove the entire lesion or tumor. When a sample of tissue or fluid is removed with a needle in such a way that cells are removed without preserving the histological architecture of the tissue cells, the procedure is called a needle aspiration biopsy. Biopsies are most commonly performed for insight into possible cancerous or inflammatory conditions.
John Wendell Thompson is an American technology executive who was the chair of Microsoft from 2014 until June 2021, and chair of Illumina from 2021 until 2023. He is a former chief executive of Virtual Instruments, a vice-president at IBM and the former chief executive of Symantec. Thompson later became an independent director on the board of Microsoft, and in February 2014, was named chairman. He led the search for Microsoft's next CEO; as a result, Satya Nadella was selected.
Illumina, Inc. is an American biotechnology company, headquartered in San Diego, California. Incorporated on April 1, 1998, Illumina develops, manufactures, and markets integrated systems for the analysis of genetic variation and biological function. The company provides a line of products and services that serves the sequencing, genotyping and gene expression, and proteomics markets, and serves more than 155 countries.
Mostafa Ronaghi is an Iranian molecular biologist, specializing in DNA sequencing methodology. He earned his Ph.D. from the Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden in 1998.
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Theranos Inc. was an American privately held corporation that was touted as a breakthrough health technology company. Founded in 2003 by then 19-year-old Elizabeth Holmes, Theranos raised more than US$700 million from venture capitalists and private investors, resulting in a $10 billion valuation at its peak in 2013 and 2014. The company claimed that it had devised blood tests that required very small amounts of blood and that could be performed rapidly and accurately, all using compact automated devices that the company had developed. These claims were proven to be false.
Robert A. Bradway is an American businessman. He is the chairman and chief executive officer of Amgen.
Elizabeth Anne Holmes is an American biotechnology entrepreneur who was convicted of fraud in connection to her blood-testing company, Theranos. The company's valuation soared after it claimed to have revolutionized blood testing by developing methods that needed only very small volumes of blood, such as from a fingerprick. In 2015, Forbes had named Holmes the youngest and wealthiest self-made female billionaire in the United States on the basis of a $9-billion valuation of her company. In the following year, as revelations of fraud about Theranos's claims began to surface, Forbes revised its estimate of Holmes's net worth to zero, and Fortune named her in its feature article on "The World's 19 Most Disappointing Leaders".
OncoMed Pharmaceuticals, Inc. was a public American pharmaceutical development company headquartered in Redwood City, California. The company was founded in August 2004 by two University of Michigan investigators, Michael Clarke and Max S. Wicha. As of 2013, the company had 83 employees. OncoMed's drug discovery work focuses on developing "targeted antibodies against cancer stem cells". The cancer stem cell technologies on which OncoMed depends are licensed from the University of Michigan where they were developed by the founders of the company. OncoMed went public in 2013 and was listed on NASDAQ under the stock symbol OMED. In April 2019 the company was acquired by Mereo BioPharma and delisted from the Nasdaq.
Foundation Medicine, Inc. is an American company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, which develops, manufactures, and sells genomic profiling assays based on next-generation sequencing technology for solid tumors, hematologic malignancies, and sarcomas.
Helix is an American population genomics company.
David A. Benaron is an American digital health entrepreneur, physician, and former Stanford University professor. His work in the field of medical optical imaging, digital health wearables, and predictive behavioral and health Artificial Intelligence led to the founding of multiple public companies. He is a member of SPIE, and a founding editorial board member of the Journal of Biomedical Optics.
Helmy Eltoukhy is an American scientist and a businessperson who co-founded startups Avantome and Guardant Health. He is best known for his contributions to genomics, semiconductor DNA sequencing, and personalized medicine. His startups were acquired by Illumina in 2008. Avantome was founded to develop and commercialize semiconductor-based DNA sequencing, during the race for the $1,000 genome. Guardant Health was founded to pioneer non-invasive liquid biopsy approaches for cancer diagnosis, monitoring, personalized medicine treatment, and research.
Richard Burnham Lanman is an American biotechnology entrepreneur, physician scientist, and naturalist. His contributions relate to improving diagnosis and utilization of less invasive medical procedures, most recently as Global Chief Medical Officer at Guardant Health, Inc., a precision oncology company that developed a blood test replacing invasive tissue biopsies to sequence tumor DNA and improve cancer treatment selection. Lanman has worked in five different medical specialties, oncology, cardiology, endocrinology, pulmonology, and psychiatry, as well as historical ecology, and has authored or co-authored over 125 peer-reviewed scientific publications.
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Guardant Health is an American biotechnology company based in Palo Alto, California. Co-founders Helmy Eltoukhy and AmirAli Talasaz serve as co-chief executive officers.
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