Stephen heads the IndieBio NY program, has a Ph.D. in Molecular Biology, and has a deep background in entrepreneurship in the pharma industry. Stephen was one of the founding scientists at Vertex Pharmaceuticals, working on many drug discovery programs, including the FDA approval of Agenerase & Lexiva. He co-founded Abpro Therapeutics, employing synthetic biology and immunology to accelerate antibody discovery and development. Recruited as CEO of SynbiCITE, the Innovation and Knowledge Center for Synthetic Biology in the UK, he oversaw a dramatic growth in the synthetic biology innovation ecosystem with a record number of startups and fundraising in this sector. At the same time, Stephen co-founded Bio-start, the UK’s first Life Science accelerator. Stephen has co-authored over 30 peer-reviewed scientific publications, including publications appearing in Nature and Cell, and has several issued patents. He has been featured in Huffington Post, Upstart, and BioScience and is a regular conference speaker and government advisor on Life Science innovation and entrepreneurship.