Team

Evan Rachlin, MD, is the co-founder and a Managing Partner of Ascenta Capital, which he co-leads with Lorence Kim.

Evan was previously a Managing Director at Blackstone Life Sciences from 2019 to 2022. Prior to Blackstone, he was Head of Strategy (reporting to the CEO) at Moderna (NASDAQ: MRNA) from 2015 to 2019, where he led development of the company’s annual long-range plan and helped formulate portfolio strategy and execute equity financings. He was a Principal at Bain Capital Ventures from 2012 to 2015, and began his career in New York City at McKinsey & Company and Pfizer.

Evan currently serves on the board of directors of Ascenta Portfolio companies Iambic Therapeutics, Cardurion Pharmaceuticals, OrsoBio, and Alpha-9 Oncology. He also serves on the board of Boston Children’s Hospital Trust, and he previously served on the boards of Fergene, Apixio, MedHOK, Boston Heart Diagnostics, and MedeAnalytics.

Evan graduated from Harvard University, magna cum laude with an A.B. in Biochemistry and Japanese. He earned an M.D. from Harvard Medical School.

Lorence Kim, MD is the co-founder and a Managing Partner of Ascenta Capital, together with Evan Rachlin.

Lorence was previously a Venture Partner at Third Rock Ventures from 2020 to 2022. He served as the Chief Financial Officer of Moderna (NASDAQ: MRNA) from 2014 to 2020, raising $4 billion for the company and deploying resources to discover and advance a pipeline of 24 development candidates across infectious disease, oncology, rare disease and autoimmune disease, including the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine. As of his departure, Moderna had raised the three largest private financing rounds, the largest IPO, and the largest follow-on offering in biotech history. Dr. Kim joined Moderna after an investment banking career at Goldman Sachs from 2000 to 2014, where he was a managing director and co-head of the U.S. biotechnology investment banking effort. Dr. Kim’s responsibilities included corporate finance and mergers and acquisitions for the biotechnology industry, with several billion in equity and equity-linked financings, and more than $55 billion in M&A transactions.

Lorence currently serves on the board of directors of Ascenta portfolio companies ADARx Pharmaceuticals, a biotech focused on RNA-targeting therapeutics, and Odyssey Therapeutics, a biotech pioneering next-generation precision autoimmune and oncology medicines. He also serves on the board of directors of Revolution Medicines (NASDAQ: RVMD), Cencora (NYSE: COR), Flare Therapeutics, Abata Therapeutics, the American Red Cross, and Prep for Prep. He previously served on the board of Cowen (NASDAQ: COWN) and Seres Therapeutics (NASDAQ: MCRB).

Lorence graduated from Harvard University, magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa with an A.B. in biochemical sciences. He earned an M.B.A. in healthcare management as a Palmer Scholar from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and an MD from the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Medicine.

Jeff Chodakewitz, MD is an Advisory Partner at Ascenta Capital. He has held leadership roles in the pharmaceutical and biotech industry over the past 30 years and has broad experience across both Early and Late Development and as a Board of Directors member at multiple companies.

Jeff’s clinical training was in internal medicine and infectious diseases with a basic research focus related to local immune modulation through macrophage/epithelial cell interactions. After transitioning to the pharmaceutical industry at Merck & Co., his initial work involved novel potential medicines related to infectious diseases and vaccines including taking molecules from initial trials in patients to worldwide approvals. Jeff led the effort to develop a HIV protease inhibitor which established the paradigm of sustained suppression of viral replication. He served as VP of Infectious Diseases & Vaccines at Merck and also supervised development of the first novel antifungal in many years as well as the development/approval of Gardasil. Jeff subsequently spent several years as VP of Early Development (including Clinical Pharmacology, Experiment Medicine, biomarkers and Imaging) across the Merck portfolio and then SVP of Late Development (post-POC through patent expiry) across all therapeutic areas. During these years, he chaired various governance committees with a scope ranging from the approval of lead molecules in Discovery, Early Development strategies/decisions and Late Development strategies/regulatory approval. Jeff subsequently served as SVP Scientific Leadership in Infectious Diseases, Respiratory and Immunology.

In 2014, Jeff became Chief Medical Officer and EVP Global Medicines Development and Medical Affairs at Vertex. Over the next 4.5 years, he oversaw the development and global approval of multiple Vertex innovative medicines to treat cystic fibrosis as well as early development of novel compounds to manage pain, multiple oncology compounds focused on DNA damage repair and initial clinical entry of a novel treatment for sickle cell disease/beta-thalassemia in collaboration with CRISPR Therapeutics. Following his retirement from Vertex in 2019, Jeff joined the Board of Directors of multiple public companies. He also served as an Executive/Senior Advisor at Blackstone Life Sciences until 2022 and volunteers as an Entrepeneur-in-Residence with Yale Ventures.

Jeff received his B.S. from Yale University and MD from Yale University School of Medicine. He trained in Internal Medicine at NYU/Bellevue and completed his fellowship in Infectious Diseases at Yale.

Michael Rosenblatt, MD is an Advisory Partner at Ascenta Capital. He has held major leadership roles in the pharmaceutical industry, academia, and biotech/venture. He was Chief Medical Officer of Merck (2009-2016) and of Flagship Pioneering (2016-2022). Prior to that he was Dean of Tufts University School of Medicine. Before that, he held the Robert Ebert Professorship in Molecular Medicine and then the George R. Minot Professorship of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. He was President of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC). Earlier he was Director of the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology and Chief of the Endocrine Unit, Massachusetts General Hospital.

Recently, Dr. Rosenblatt contributed to Moderna’s coronavirus vaccine team effort in several roles, including as special consultant to the chief medical officer. The first of two times at Merck, he was Senior Vice President for Research where he co-led the development of alendronate (FOSAMAX), now the leading therapy worldwide for osteoporosis. Later as Merck’s Chief Medical Officer, he was part of the team that developed the immune oncology drug, pembrolizumab (KEYTRUDA); he crafted its ‘compassionate use’ program. He was a founder of ProScript, the company that discovered bortezomib (Velcade), which became Takeda’s drug for multiple myeloma, and Radius Pharmaceuticals, a women’s health company. He was a member of the Board of Scientific Counselors of two NIH institutes and was elected to Fellowship in the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American College of Physicians.

Dr. Rosenblatt serves as chairperson of the Drug Information Association (DIA) and the Prix Galien USA Awards Committee. He is a member of the Harvard Medical School Board of Fellows and on the research advisory committees of the Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and Children’s Hospital (Boston).

Dr. Rosenblatt graduated summa cum laude from Columbia and received an MD magna cum laude from Harvard. Internship, residency, and endocrinology training were all at the Massachusetts General Hospital. He is the recipient of the Fuller Albright Award and the Vincent du Vigneaud Award for his research, and the Chairman’s Award from Merck.

Paul Deutsch, MD, PhD, is an Advisory Partner at Ascenta, joining after 31 years in Translational Medicine and Early Development at Merck and Sanofi.

Paul’s basic research experience and clinical specialty training was in Pharmacology and Endocrinology, laying the groundwork for his pharmaceutical career with emphasis on molecular mechanisms. His Pharma experience has spanned the gamut of therapeutic areas, including Oncology for which he served stints as Clinical Head ad-interim at both companies. Paul’s focus throughout his career has been execution and oversight of projects from late Research through First-in-Human and rapid Proof of Concept. He oversaw efforts in a broad array of therapeutic modalities. His most recent position at Sanofi was Senior VP, Global Head of Translational Medicine and Early Development. His scope included biomarkers and precision medicine, clinical pharmacology, and critical analysis of modeling. Favorite sound bite: “It’s all about the dose.” He served as co-chair of R&D Committees responsible for pipeline decisions and governance in both Research and Development. He had key input for dozens of First-in-Human projects, and for multiple medically and commercially successful medicines such as the mega-blockbuster Dupixent. He hopes to have planted the seeds for blockbusters of the future: just prior to his retirement from Sanofi, Paul’s group performed the FIH and rapid proof-of-mechanism studies for an oral TNF antagonist (psoriasis) and an anti-13/TSLP NANOBODY® (asthma).

Paul received his A.B. from Harvard College and MD PhD from the Medical Scientist Training Program at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. He trained in Internal Medicine and Endocrinology at Mass General Hospital and was a Cornell Scholar at Weill-Cornell College of Medicine with a research program in Molecular Endocrinology.

John Gutierrez, MD, is a Vice President at Ascenta Capital. He joined the firm in 2023 and focuses on discovering and evaluating new investment opportunities.

Prior to joining Ascenta, John was a Senior Associate in the healthcare investment banking group at Goldman Sachs, where he advised biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies on strategic financial transactions, including equity offerings and M&A.

John earned his MD from Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons and an M.B.A. from Columbia Business School. He graduated with his B.A. in economics from the University of Florida.

Leighanne Oh, MS, is a Vice President at Ascenta Capital. She joined the firm in 2024 and focuses on discovering and evaluating new investment opportunities. She brings with her private and public investing experience and an operating background.

Before joining Ascenta, Leighanne spent the last 5 years investing in biotech and life sciences companies at Novo Holdings and Sofinnova Investments. Leighanne started her investing career at SoBE Bioequities (Sofinnova’s L/S hedge fund), focusing on public investments in global biotech and pharmaceutical companies. She later served on Sofinnova’s investment committee as a private investor focused on clinical stage investments from 2019 – 2022 and at Novo Holdings from 2022-2024. Before that, Leighanne began her career as an Analyst on the Healthcare Investment Banking team at Jefferies. In that role, she focused on M&A, public and private capital raising, licensing deals, and a wide scope of advisory work for biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies. Trained as a protein and biomedical engineer, Leighanne also brings her operating background as a manufacturing engineer from GE Healthcare.

Leighanne earned her M.S. and B.S.E. in Biomedical Engineering from Duke University and is a Gates Millennium Scholar.

Dave Shields serves as the CFO at Ascenta Capital. He joined the firm in 2023. With over 20 years of experience in the finance industry, Dave has dedicated most of his career to the Private Equity & Venture Capital sectors.

Prior to joining Ascenta Capital, Dave held key financial roles at firms including Greylock Partners, Audax Group and Bain & Co. Most recently, Dave served as the CFO of Bolt VC, an early-stage venture firm, where he made significant contributions over a span of seven years.

Dave earned his B.S. in Economics from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

Tami Daelen is Chief of Staff at Ascenta Capital. She joined the firm in 2023 and has over 15 years of executive support experience. Prior to joining Ascenta, she was Executive Assistant to the Managing General Partner leading the private equity firm, Norwest Equity Partners. Before Norwest, Tami supported the C-Suite at TEGNA, a public multimedia publishing company. Tami began her career in Project Management at Mayo Clinic and Bank of America.

Tami received her B.S. from the University of Southern California, where she majored in international finance.

Nancy is the Executive Assistant at Ascenta Capital. She joined the firm in Fall of 2023 and has over 20 years of executive support experience. Her most recent role was Executive Assistant to several C-Suite members of Moderna, including the Chief Financial Officer, Chief Communications Officer and the Head of Investor Relations. During her 7-year career with Moderna, she assisted the financial team through several capital raises in excess of $4B. Nancy was the corporate lead for the international roadshow, leading to the largest biotech IPO in December 2018. Additional roles at Moderna, included assisting the Chief Human Resources Officer & Chief Technology Officer. Nancy’s prior experience spans a variety of industries; Executive Recruitment (Spencer Stuart), Management Consulting (Bain & Co. and Boston Consulting Group); Venture Capital (MPM Capital) and Technology (iCube/Razorfish and Lotus Development Corp.) Nancy received her B.S. from Westfield State College where she majored in Marketing.