Robert Bazemore
President & Chief Executive Officer
Epizyme
Robert (Rob) Bazemore has served as President and Chief Executive Officer since September 2015. Prior to joining Epizyme, Rob served as Chief Operating Officer of Synageva, where he established the company’s global commercial and medical organization to support the first product launch and helped lead the broader transition to a sustainable commercial enterprise, through its acquisition in July 2015. With more than 25 years of experience across the life sciences industry, Rob held several senior leadership positions at Johnson & Johnson. This included his role as President of Janssen Biotech, where he led the successful launches of numerous products and indications, including the U.S. launches of the oncology therapies ZYTIGA® and IMBRUVICA®, as well as guiding the company’s worldwide immunology portfolio strategy. Prior to Johnson & Johnson, he worked at Merck & Co., Inc. for 11 years in roles of increasing responsibility, including the launch of SINGULAIR® in the U.S.
Rob received a B.S. in Biochemistry from the University of Georgia. Formerly a board member of Neon Therapeutics, Rob currently sits on the Board of Directors of Ardelyx, Inc and Nuvation Bio, Inc.
Dr. Shefali Agarwal
Executive Vice President, Chief Medical and Development Officer
Epizyme
Dr. Shefali Agarwal serves as Executive Vice President and Chief Medical and Development Officer at Epizyme. Prior to joining the company in 2018, Shefali held leadership positions across medical research, clinical development, clinical operations and medical affairs. She most recently served as chief medical officer at SQZ Biotech, where she built and led the clinical development organization, which included clinical research operations and the regulatory function. Before SQZ Biotech, Shefali also held leadership positions at Curis and Tesaro. At Curis, she oversaw the Phase 2 study for its dual HDAC/PI3K inhibitor in diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, and the Phase 1 study in solid tumors for its oral checkpoint inhibitor. At Tesaro, she led the NDA and EMA submissions for ZEJULA® (niraparib) in ovarian cancer. Shefali has also held positions of increasing responsibility at Covidien, AVEO Oncology and Pfizer.
In addition to receiving her medical degree, Shefali holds a Master of Public Health and a Master of Science in business. She currently sits on the Board of Directors of Fate Therapeutics.
Dr. Jeffery Kutok
Chief Scientific Officer
Epizyme
Jeffery Kutok, M.D., Ph.D., joined Epizyme in April 2020 as the Chief Scientific Officer from Infinity Pharmaceuticals, where he served as executive vice president and chief scientific officer. During his tenure at Infinity, Jeff was responsible for leading the organization’s scientific strategy, preclinical development and translational science. Prior to joining Infinity in 2010, Jeff was an associate professor of pathology at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, where he focused on translational medicine research and biomarker identification in cancer. Jeff is board certified in anatomic pathology and hematology and had clinical duties in Hematopathology and Molecular Diagnostics at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. He is also an author of more than 200 journal articles, reviews and book chapters.
Jeff earned his B.S. in biology and his M.D., Ph.D. in medicine and molecular pathology from the State University of New York at Stony Brook.
Matthew Ros
Executive Vice President, Chief Strategy and Business Officer
Epizyme
Matthew (Matt) Ros serves as Executive Vice President, Chief Strategy and Business Officer, overseeing Epizyme’s corporate strategy and business functions. He joined Epizyme in May 2016 as the company’s Chief Operating Officer. Before joining Epizyme, Matt served as COO and global head of Sanofi-Genzyme’s $1.4 billion Oncology franchise, leading its restructuring and revised business strategy. Prior to his tenure at Sanofi, Matt served as senior vice president at ARIAD Pharmaceuticals, leading their oncology commercialization efforts. Matt also held positions of increasing responsibility throughout a highly distinguished 17-year career in Bristol-Myers Squibb’s Oncology franchise and contributed to the successful launches of brands that changed the standards of oncology care. Matt has built a career and reputation on his ability to build and lead organizations to deliver patient-focused results.
Matt earned a BS in Business Administration from SUNY Plattsburgh. He currently sits on the Board of Directors of Cogent Biosciences (formerly Unum Therapeutics).
Dr. Ari Melnick
Professor of Hematology and Medical Oncology
Weill Cornell Medicine
Dr. Ari Melnick is the Gebroe Family Professor of Hematology and Medical Oncology at Weill Cornell Medicine and Chair, Hematologic Malignancies Program at Weill Cornell Cancer Center. He is also the Director of the Sackler Center for Biomedical and Physical Sciences at Weill Cornell Medicine. Dr. Melnick is a leader in the field of heme malignancies and cancer epigenetics. Some of his major findings include the first large-scale epigenomics studies in humans, showing that aberrant epigenetic programming is a hallmark of cancer and that epigenetic diversity is a fundamental determinant of tumor fitness and unfavorable clinical outcomes. This work led him to important mechanistic observations, for example how mutations in IDH1, IDH2 disrupt the epigenome through production of an aberrant oncometabolite, and how mutations in TET2, WT1, IDH1/2 and FLT3 drive leukemogenesis through cooperative reprogramming of the epigenome. He has fundamentally established the role of epigenetic dysfunction in lymphomagenesis, through mechanistic analysis of chromatin modifiers such as EZH2, CREBBP, EP300, KDM1A, KMT2D, HISTH1, TBL1XR1 and TET2. He has pioneered the study of nuclear topology mechanisms controlling the humoral immune response and leading to malignant transformation of B-cells. He has developed novel targeted therapies against key lymphoma oncoprotein such as BCL6, SIRT3 and MALT1, the latter of which are currently in clinical trials. He has authored more than 300 manuscripts, has held many national leadership roles, organized a number of scientific meetings, and invested considerable effort in mentoring trainees and junior faculty, many of whom currently have their own highly distinguished careers in basic and translational research.
Dr. Melnick obtained his medical degree from University of Buenos Aires School of Medicine and completed his post-doctoral training at Mount Sinai School of Medicine.