From Idea to Impact: Funding Women in Health Innovation

A compassionate and strategic leader, Ms. Bartie’s career journey has taken many turns, but her path has always been clear – the commitment to help people – first as a lawyer/public defender, and then as a biopharmaceutical industry professional, continuing to act as a voice for those with unmet needs and unequal access. Prior to joining Bristol Myers Squibb, Ms. Bartie was Vice President and Head of Commercial Operations for U.S. Oncology at Merck.  In this capacity, she was responsible for leading the sales, key accounts, market access, pricing and policy organizations within the U.S. Business Unit. Previously, Ms. Bartie served as Associate Vice-President of Global Marketing for Genitourinary Cancers (GU), including renal cell carcinoma, prostate cancer and bladder cancer and as the Global Disease Lead for Women’s Cancer. Prior to joining Merck, she held a range of commercial roles with increasing responsibility in sales, business analytics and marketing in cardiovascular neuroscience, osteoporosis, lung cancer, supportive care and chronic myeloid leukemia at various companies, including Novartis, Heron Therapeutics, Johnson & Johnson, Pharmacia and Abbott Labs.  

Prior to her career in biopharma, Ms. Bartie was a Public Defender in Washington, DC and Bronx, New York. She received her Bachelor of Arts from Clark Atlanta University and her Juris Doctor from Loyola University Chicago, School of Law. Ms. Bartie is an HBA Rising Star and was recognized by HBA as a Luminary in 2020.

Julie Castro Abrams is the founder and Managing Partner of How Women Invest, an early-stage venture firm focused on high-growth, tech-enabled women-founded enterprises. With over twenty years as a CEO and board director, Julie brings extensive experience in supporting and identifying early-stage entrepreneurs. As the CEO of Women's Initiative for Self Employment, she helped launch a network of over 6,000 successful women-owned businesses. Julie is also involved in promoting corporate board diversity and has been a key player in driving legislative initiatives for women's advancement. Julie has received numerous awards and recognition for her work and has been featured in several books and media outlets.

Jessica Karr is Founder & Managing Director of Coyote Ventures, an early stage venture capital fund backing founders solving problems that disproportionately affect overlooked populations. Jessica’s experience launching novel impact-focused products began when she joined Impossible Foods as the 12th employee, where she helped develop and launch the Impossible burger. She has since worked with startups internationally as an innovation consultant and as a Principal with a family office. She is an LP in women-led funds and her angel investments have all become unicorns. Jessica holds a MS in Biochemistry from UC San Diego, an MBA from Presidio Graduate School, and a BA in Philosophy from Texas State University. Jessica lives in the Bay Area with her rescue Pom and enjoys swimming in the bay.

Nola  Masterson is a Venture Partner in the Femtech Funds at Portfolia. She has a long history of being a venture capitalist starting in 1983 with KPCB and TVM Capital in 2000. She is the cofounder of Sequenom, which developed the early testing for DNA in maternal blood. She was the first analyst on Wall Street for biotechnology in the 1980's. She has been a pioneer for women in business and has had a successful business career with Millipore and as an entrepreneur and board member. She has a BS and MT(ACP) from Fordham Marymount College, and an MSc from George Washington University. She enjoys oil painting and horse back riding.

Ibraheem is a serial entrepreneur and now venture fund/studio builder in biotechnology and digital health - fighting for diversity and inclusion in health equity. He builds businesses and facilitates the bi-directional flow of resources to improve the health of communities as the Vice President of 2Flo Ventures

Ibraheem is a Gates Scholar and holds a degree from Northwestern University in Industrial Engineering. His experience spans working on multi-million-dollar research commercialization projects with Fortune 100 companies and academic institutions to roles in venture capital to invest in underrepresented populations, to building City Health Tech, a startup focused on building technologies to support healthy communities.

His work has been featured in national publications like the Obama Foundation and Forbes. Over the last 6 years, he has personally trained hundreds of students in entrepreneurship and venture capital. He has a strong passion for teaching and finding ways to collaborate to help others. His long-term goal is to help build the healthy and regenerative cities of the future.

Shelley Zalis is the Founder and CEO of The Female Quotient, an experiential, media, and transformation advisory company that advances gender equality in the workplace. The FQ has the world’s largest community of professional women and conscious leaders, reaching over 5 Million people globally. Zalis is a pioneer for online research, and was the first female CEO ranked in the research industry’s top 25. In 2010, Zalis sold her company OTX (Online Testing Exchange) to Ipsos for $80 Million. Today, Zalis works with Fortune 500 companies, impact organizations, and conscious leaders to advance equality in the workplace.  In addition to being a contributor to TIME, Zalis authors a Forbes column, and has been named the #18 most influential voice on LinkedIn worldwide. She is also the co-founder of #SeeHer, a movement led by the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) to increase the accurate portrayal of women and girls in advertising and media.

Bill Taranto is the founder and President of MGHIF and is responsible for leading the GHI capability for Merck. The Merck Global Health Innovation Fund was established in late 2010 as a strategic response to the challenges surrounding Merck's core business of discovering, developing, and marketing innovative drugs and vaccines.  

The $600 million evergreen fund is focused on identifying opportunities that are adjacent to Merck’s core business of pharmaceuticals and vaccines. Under Bill’s leadership, GHIF has invested more than $1 Billion in 70+ companies, with over $7+ billion in exits, making MGHIF one of the largest and most successful digital health investors. Significant investments include PathAI, M2GEN, Navigating Cancer, Syapse, Strata, Precise DX, Trinetx, and Cleardata. Recent exits include Livongo Health, Preventice Solutions, Ciox and Absci. 

Mr. Taranto reports to the SVP, Chief Strategy Officer. Mr. Taranto is a member of the Merck Innovation Ventures Board, a group that manages the identification and funding of portfolio investments; and is also Chairman of the GHI Fund LLC Management Board. Mr. Taranto most recently was Chairman of the Board, Preventice Solutions Inc., prior Board Member Livongo Health, Advisory Board Member Global Corporate Venturing and Advisory Board Member Health XL and Chairman, Advisory Board to Columbia HITLAB.

Prior to joining Merck, Mr. Taranto spent 18 years at Johnson & Johnson and started his career in investment banking. Mr. Taranto has a Bachelor of Business Administration from St. Bonaventure University.

William B. Holmes, Jr. serves as the Novartis Director of US Supplier Diversity and a member of the US Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DEI) leadership team. He partners with Procurement to embed diversity, equity and inclusion into procurement processes and business strategies to deliver value for Novartis, while contributing socio-economic impact through engagement with small and/or minority-, women-, veteran-, LGBT-, and disability-owned businesses. In his role, he has developed a new framework, multi-year strategy for Novartis US supplier diversity efforts, aligned to corporate business priorities. In addition to his leadership in supplier diversity, he also serves on internal task forces for marketing and clinical trial diversity.  

Prior to joining Novartis in November 2021, William held leadership roles for award-winning supplier diversity programs at Merck and GSK. He led the establishment of GSK’s global program, expanding from the US into the UK. While at Merck, William played a pivotal role in building a global supplier diversity program that became the first pure-play pharmaceutical company to join the Billion Dollar Roundtable (BDR) by spending over $1B annually with US diverse suppliers, and reached across other countries such as the UK, Canada, South Africa, Brazil and Australia. William’s earlier experience at Merck included procurement roles as a Sourcing Manager for both Global R&D Lab Supplies and Global IT Services.

William previously served on the Board of Directors for both the Diversity Alliance for Science (DA4S) and Eastern Minority Supplier Development Council (EMSDC). He is a past recipient of the Minority Supplier Development Council UK Corporate Supplier Diversity Excellence Award, the National Minority Supplier Development Council Corporation of the Year Award and the DA4S Corporation of the Year Award. William is a graduate of Virginia Union University in Richmond, VA. He currently resides in Pennsylvania with his wife and four children.

Throughout his career – one that spans the likes of McKinsey & Company and Cognizant Technology Solutions – Shankar has held a singular belief that the pursuit of making a real impact should guide each and every action. Shankar brings that same belief to Real Chemistry as CEO, leading the company to make a lasting impact by transforming what healthcare is to what it should be.

Shankar’s big picture, growth-minded experience drives Real Chemistry’s strategy of helping the healthcare industry better understand, reach, and engage patients and professionals using AI and Ideas. Prior to joining Real Chemistry, Shankar served as Chief Operating Officer at Equian, where his strategic and operational leadership contributed to successfully integrating nine companies, doubling revenue, tripling EBITDA and providing an eight-fold return in its sale to Optum, a UnitedHealth Group company. Before his time at Equian, he provided similar outcomes-oriented leadership at both McKinsey & Company, where he worked with some of the world’s leading pharmaceutical companies on strategic and transformation initiatives, and Cognizant, where he led the Life Sciences Business unit.

Beyond his uncanny ability to create shareholder value and his commitment to client impact and operational excellence, Shankar is a passionate people leader. His priority is on making sure our greatest asset – our people – continue to call Real Chemistry one of the Best Places to Work in our industry by making sure they are equipped, engaged and motivated to do their best work every day. 

Shankar is a member of the Board of Directors of HealthComp, the largest independent health plan administrator for self-funded employer groups in the U.S. He is also a champion for several non-profit organizations focusing on education (Pratham and Akanksha) and maternal and child health (Antara Foundation).

Shankar resides with his wife and two children in the Boston area.

Jamie Doolittle is a seasoned leader with 16 years of experience in Business and Commercial banking at BMO. She is currently the Head of Business Banking for Central Region Ontario.

Over the years, Jamie has worked closely with entrepreneurs and business leaders and has been a strong advocate for the advancement of women in business. As a dedicated leader, she has inspired and led a talented team of banking professionals to activate a winning culture and consistently exceed their performance objectives. She’s passionate about developing her team’s talent and empowering them to unlock their full potential to have a real impact on the business.
Eager to share her knowledge, Jamie has led several workshops and skill builders on topics such as financial literacy, franchising, supporting female entrepreneurs, business development, and helping entrepreneurs succeed and build a brighter future.

Jamie holds a Bachelor’s degree in Management and Organizational Studies from Western University and has obtained her CPA Designation from CPA Ontario.
Jamie was recently recognized as one of Canada’s Most Powerful Women: Top 100, presented to exceptional women who make a transformational difference in their field and actively shape a more inclusive future.

Hirak is a Principal and has been on the investments team of  JJDC since 2021. He is based out of the Boston Innovation Center in Cambridge, MA. Hirak initiates and manages equity investments across MedTech in East North America for Johnson and Johnson. In addition to serving on several boards of our portfolio companies, he is very active in the local venture ecosystem. Before the role at JJDC, Hirak was the Fund Manager for the Michigan Biomedical Venture Fund, a seed-stage fund since its inception in 2016. Hirak invested in life-sciences start-up companies across multiple categories: therapeutics, devices, diagnostics, and health IT/digital technologies. 

Hirak received a PhD from the University of Michigan in Biomedical Engineering and, Master’s degrees in Electrical Engineering and Biomedical Engineering also at the University of Michigan. He received a Bachelor of Engineering in Electronics and Telecommunication Engineering from the University of Pune in India.
Hirak likes to read, play the guitar, dabble in B/W photography, and run marathons in his spare time.