Co-founder in Residence, Next Generation Therapeutics for Parkinson's Disease

ABOUT THE ROLE

At DSV we’re looking for future Founders, entrepreneurially minded individuals with industry-specific technical and commercial domain expertise eager to solve urgent unmet challenges through venture building.

You will join DSV’s venture creation programme as a Founder in Residence and work closely with the DSV team, using our methodology , to spin-out a new company. During the programme, you’ll work on all aspects related to venture creation in this opportunity area, including working out the optimal approach to solve for the desired outcome, building a team and building a viable business case. Once the new venture is incorporated with pre-seed investment from DSV, you and your co-founders will own the majority stake in the business and continue receiving support from the DSV team post-spinout.

The role is full-time, fully remote until venture incorporation and spin-out, after - TBD.

THE OPPORTUNITY AREA

Over 6 million individuals live with Parkinson’s disease (PD) today, and this number is projected to reach 12 million globally by 2040 as populations age. Whilst current therapies do offer symptomatic relief from debilitating motor symptoms, no clinically approved drug intervenes at root cause, meaning disease progression cannot be prevented. In addition, emerging therapeutics which show great promise in animal models of PD often fail to translate in the clinical setting, with even the most successful clinical trials reporting incremental benefit, often capped by dose limiting toxicity. 

To address this, we are partnering with Parkinson’s UK to develop precise, next generation therapies which target true disease modifying nodes in previously unimagined ways. As PD is a multi-pathway pathology, spanning oxidative stress, impaired autophagy, mitochondrial dysfunction and neuroinflammation, the efficacy of single pathway approaches is constrained. 

OUR APPROACH 

We are designing a therapeutic approach that will target master homeostatic regulators which can simultaneously correct numerous PD pathways, changing the course of disease. We believe this has the potential to transform patient lives by slowing, halting or even reversing disease progression. This pathway has been the focus of drug development in the past but not been drugged successfully through classic approaches. We are looking to unlock this through the use of novel modalities and a clever target selection and targeting strategy that has the potential to overcome the many feedback looks regulating this pathway. 

Requirements

WHO SHOULD APPLY

Essential (must-have):

• PhD in neuroscience or other field relevant to the project;
• Extensive, systems-level knowledge of Parkinson’s disease, including at the cellular and molecular level;
• Expertise in oxidative stress and/or neuroprotective pathways; 
• Experience in cellular, molecular and/or biochemical approaches to drug discovery for CNS disorders;
• Experience working in biotech/pharma or an alternative setting which requires strong commercial awareness and understanding of the drug development process;
• Entrepreneurial spirit, likely demonstrated through impactful innovation;
• You are innovative, creative, and guided by first-principles thinking;
• You are highly motivated to create curative solutions for PD patients.

Preferred (nice-to-have):

• Broad knowledge of brain-specific drug delivery techniques;
• Experience in nucleic acid based payloads (ASO/siRNA/DNA) and delivery techniques;
• Track record of high quality publications in the field, or thought leadership in the field;
• High level industry experience in either pharma, biotech, scientific start-ups, life sciences consulting, life sciences VC, or have previously been an inventor/contributor on patents, etc.;
• Fundraising experience at seed and Series A stages, with established investor contacts.

Benefits

OUR OFFER

By joining DSV, you’ll be joining a team of operators who have founded companies and led translation of science at some of the most respected universities, charities, funds and government agencies. 2/3 of the team have founded or led a company at C-suite and 65% have a PhD. Our team dedicate several hours every week to each Founder/founding team to provide tailored guidance, resources and feedback covering every aspect of what it takes to successfully launch a new venture from both the tech and commercial perspectives:

• We provide optimised, purpose-built, proprietary tools, resources and processes to help create high-impact ventures from scratch, using our venture creation methodology;
• We draw on opportunity area specific know-how provided by our Partner organisation - Parkinson's UK - working collaboratively with their team of experts and Advisors;
• We provide £250k launch investment (subject to Investment Committee approval) to incorporate the new venture and develop early proof-of-concept data that’s needed to attract high profile VCs as well as non-dilutive grant funding;
• We provide guaranteed income of £4,166 per month paid to each Founder-in-Residence as a fixed consultancy fee until the company is launched and the pre-seed investment is secured;
• You and the current Founder-in-Residence, together with any additional co-founders, will collectively own a majority equity stake in the company;
• We provide continuous support after post spin-out, including fundraising, commercial partnerships, recruitment and team-building (amongst other things); plus
• There are dozens of Founders currently at DSV across sectors working collaboratively and supporting one another - a unique resource to draw on.

WHO YOU'LL BE JOINING

You will be joining Dr. Kiren Baines-Mortimore, an accomplished scientific leader with many years of experience across drug discovery and development. Kiren, is the former co-founder and CSO at Extracellular, a cultivated meat CDMO. Prior to founding Extracellular, Kiren was the Analytical Development and Quality Control Lead at eXmoor Pharma,where she supported clients in the cell and gene therapy sector with process and analytical development, manufacturing, and commercialization. Earlier in her career, Kiren contributed to drug discovery initiatives at Charles River Laboratories. Kiren earned her PhD in Cell Biology from the University of Bristol. Kiren’s background in Parkinson’s combined with her expertise in drug development, along with her outstanding professionalism and ambition, makes her a top talent to work with. 

ABOUT DSV

Deep Science Ventures is creating a future in which both humans and the planet can thrive. 

We use our unique venture creation process to create, spin-out and invest into science companies, combining available scientific knowledge and founder-type scientists into high-impact ventures. 

We operate in 4 sectors: Pharmaceuticals, Climate, Agriculture and Computation, tackling the challenges defining those areas by taking a first principles approach and partnering with leading institutions.

ABOUT OUR PARTNERSHIP WITH PARKINSON'S UK

In a landmark collaboration that marries scientific prowess with an unwavering dedication to improving patient lives, Deep Science Ventures, an avant-garde venture creator headquartered in London, has announced a pioneering partnership with Parkinson’s UK , the leading charity driving better care, treatments, and quality of life for those affected by Parkinson’s.

This strategic alliance is set to merge DSV’s unique invention method with Parkinson’s UK’s rich insights into patient care, igniting the creation of a new, dedicated company. The aim is to propel the most innovative and efficient therapeutic approach into real-world application, funded by the transformative Parkinson’s Virtual Biotech initiative - Parkinson’s UK investment arm.