About us

David has more than 40 years of experience in various leadership roles within the ophthalmic pharmaceutical industry and is currently the Board Chairman of Oxular and a Board member of the Glaucoma Foundation.

He was previously CEO of Nightstar Therapeutics, a private biopharmaceutical company specialising in developing ocular gene therapies for patients with inherited retinal dystrophies with David leading the company through a successful NASDAQ listing and M&A transaction. He was previously Vice President of Johnson & Johnson’s Vision Care Franchise, and, prior to that, held several roles at Allergan for 25 years, including Regional President. Mr. Fellows holds a B.A. in Psychology from Butler University.

Nadia is a retinal specialist and the former Chief Medical Officer at Gyroscope Therapeutics which was acquired by Novartis in 2022 for up to $1.5 billion.

Prior to her time at Gyroscope, Nadia was Director of the Boston Image Reading Center and Consultant at the New England Eye Center, Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston. She trained in Ophthalmology at the Harvard Medical School/Mass Eye and Ear Infirmary Program in Ophthalmology, which was followed by a fellowship in retina at the Harvard Medical School/Mass Eye and Ear Infirmary in Boston. Nadia received her medical degree from the Aga Khan University Medical School, Pakistan, and a Master in Public Health from the Harvard School of Public Health. Nadia has authored over 100 papers in peer-reviewed publications, has co-authored and edited three books in Ophthalmology and has participated as a principal investigator or co-investigator in multiple clinical trials.

Abraham brings 25 years of experience in gene therapy, ranging from discovery research to early-stage clinical trials.

Most recently, he was Chief Scientific Officer at AGTC leading the ophthalmology & neuroscience research programs. Prior to that, Abraham was Chief Science Officer at IVERIC Bio. Before his tenure at IVERIC Bio, he served as Vice President and Head of Ophthalmology/Gene Editing at Casebia Therapeutics, where he built out the ophthalmology R&D group from the ground-up. Prior to Casebia, he served as the Head of Gene Therapy Research at Sanofi Genzyme, where he was responsible for all aspects of gene therapy discovery and pre-clinical research. Abraham earned his Ph.D. in molecular biology at the Indiana University School of Medicine followed by post-doctoral training in molecular virology at St. Louis University School of Medicine and gene therapy at University of Washington School of Medicine. Abraham has over 50 publications and 20 patents and currently serves on several committees for the American Society for Gene and Cell Therapy.

Andrew has more than 20 years of experience leading finance operations in the pharma industry.

Recently he was SVP Finance of Gyroscope Therapeutics where he spent 3 years supporting the company build, completing private financing rounds, and latterly leading the corporate diligence and transaction closing activities enabling the $1.5bn acquisition of Gyroscope by Novartis in 2022. Prior to that he led finance in senior roles in Sanofi across Europe, as well at Otsuka pharmaceuticals.

Andrew is a Chartered Accountant by profession, and is graduated from the universities of Nottingham (Mathematics) and Oxford (Financial Strategy).

Gwenaelle is a senior regulatory leader with over 30 years’ experience in global regulatory strategy in biopharma.

She is currently SVP, Regulatory and Quality at Beacon and a Regulatory Advisor to Syncona Investment Management Ltd.

Most recently, Gwenaelle was Vice President International Regulatory Affairs at Gilead, leading the International Regulatory Group which was responsible for regulatory activities worldwide, excluding the US. Her prior roles included global and regional positions at Pfizer, Pharmacia and AstraZeneca.

Gwenaelle holds a masters in Pharmaceutical Medicines from Hibernia College (IE) and a master in Microbiology from l’Universite de Bretagne Occidentale (FR).

Before joining Beacon’s Executive Leadership Team, Ben worked with Syncona’s investment team supporting the due diligence for the AGTC acquisition and leading the set-up of the UK arm of the company in London.

Ben spent the majority of his career with GlaxoSmithKline where he has over a 20 years’ experience across the full breadth of business environments, from target identification to marketed product, and enjoyed the personal and professional growth gained from working and living around the world. Latterly Ben worked with GlaxoSmithKline’s senior R&D management to build a new functional genomics department at GSK in partnership with Boston Consulting Group, defining the group’s remit, operational structure and initial portfolio. Ben held various strategy, operations and internal consultancy roles leading business innovation projects, developing strategy and delivering change programs. Earlier in his career Ben worked in small molecule development and manufacturing roles, building deep CMC expertise. Ben holds a Master’s in Medicinal Chemistry.

Duncan is a chartered UK and European patent attorney with 20 years’ experience in life science intellectual property matters.

Before joining Beacon in 2023, he spent seven years building up and leading the IP department of liver-directed AAV gene therapy developer Freeline as it progressed from start-up to NASDAQ-listed clinical phase biotech. He also directed IP efforts during the early stages of ocular gene therapy-focused companies NightStaRx Therapeutics and Gyroscope Therapeutics, which were later acquired by Biogen and Novartis respectively. Valuable prior experience was gained as part of GSK Vaccines’ IP department, where he had responsibility for the core paediatric vaccine franchise, during the highly strategic and contentious period which preceded GSK’s acquisition of Novartis’ vaccines business. Duncan obtained a PhD in molecular genetics from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland for research performed at the MRC Human Genetics Unit, and subsequently gained his professional IP qualifications while working in private practice at Dehns in London, UK, before moving in-house at GSK.