Drew Memmott is currently the Senior Vice President for Research Administration at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Associate Director for Administration for the Dana-Farber/Harvard Cancer Center, a National Cancer Institute (NCI) designated Comprehensive Cancer Center comprised of 5 Harvard-affiliated teaching hospitals and 2 Harvard biomedical schools. He is the senior administrative leader for all aspects of research at DFCI and the DF/HCC consortium. In his role as SVP he is responsible for oversight of the research administrative infrastructure (including grant and contract management, core facilities, laboratory operations, and the animal resource facility) and clinical research operations (including clinical trials administration and operations, Institutional Review Board, protocol review approval and activation, and clinical trials financial management). In his role as Associate Director for Administration for DF/HCC he oversees the administration of the DF/HCC Cancer Center Support Grant and its associated operational requirements including administration, shared resources, and clinical research support.
Prior to DFCI Drew held a number of senior leadership roles at Mayo Clinic. He was the Associate Director for Administration for the Mayo Clinic Comprehensive Cancer Center, an NCI designated national cancer center with operations in three geographic regions. Additionally, Drew also served as a Director of Research Administration at Columbia University Medical Center.
Drew is an active member of the Cancer Center Administrator’s Forum (CCAF), an organization of NCI designated Cancer Center Administrators; the Association of American Cancer Institutes (AACI); an External Advisory Board Member for several NCI designated cancer centers; and the National Council of University Research Administrators (NCURA) where he has served in multiple committee leadership roles.

Jennifer Chan was appointed Vice President, Policy and External Affairs, at Merck Canada Inc. as of June 1, 2014 and is responsible for the company’s team of government relations and public affairs specialists.  Prior to this role, she held the position of Vice President, Policy and Communications at Merck Canada since December 2011.

A native of Montreal, Jennifer began her career in academic research before joining Schering-Plough in 1993 as a Clinical Research Associate. Since then, she has worked in various areas of the business, primarily in Regulatory Affairs, Specialty Services and Medical Affairs. She was Director of Regulatory Affairs, for Schering Plough at the time of the merger with Merck in 2009.

Jennifer is a member of the Board of Directors of the Institute of Health Economics in Alberta, as well as the Quebec Consortium for Drug Discovery and the Quebec Network for Personalized Health Care. She is a member of the board of Life Sciences Ontario and has served as a Merck for Mothers ambassador in Canada since the program was launched in 2011. Jennifer holds a Bachelor of Science degree in physiology and a Master of Science degree in pharmacology and therapeutics, both from McGill University in Montreal. She completed the last year of her master’s degree at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas.

As Healthcare Industry Lead for Microsoft Canada, Peter Jones is responsible for developing the strategy vision of modern healthcare for the Canadian marketplace. Working closely with the Microsoft Worldwide Healthcare team, Peter is deeply enriched in the best practices of healthcare digital transformation that is being practiced by healthcare industry leaders around the globe. Peter’s mandate is to help clients improve their clinical and operational performance by leveraging Microsoft solutions for healthcare data and records management, advanced analytics, and big data, while remaining compliant. Peter joined Microsoft nearly 20 years ago and has been focused on the healthcare industry for over 10 years. He is actively involved in a number Health Informatics groups such as COACH, CHIEF (Advisor), and is an active ITAC Health board member.

Charles Weijer is Professor and Canada Research Chair in Bioethics at the Rotman Institute of Philosophy at Western University in London, Canada. He is the leading expert on the ethics of randomized controlled trials. In 2008, Charles founded the Rotman Institute of Philosophy, which is dedicated to fostering collaboration between the humanities and the sciences, and served as the Institute’s first director. In 2014, he received Western’s Hellmuth Prize for Achievement in Research, and, in 2016, he was elected to the Royal Society of Canada

Dr. Frank Naus is the Chief Operating Officer of Allphase Clinical Research Inc., a Canadian CRO headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario. Frank earned his Doctorate in Business Administration from Walden University and has an MBA from Wilfrid Laurier University and MSc and BSc degrees in Applied Health Sciences from the University of Waterloo. Frank started his career in the pharmaceutical and clinical research industry. Prior to joining Allphase, he was Vice President Research at Hamilton Health Sciences.

Dr. Jason Field is the President and CEO of Life Sciences Ontario (LSO), the industry voice for the life sciences sector in Ontario. Jason obtained his PhD in Chemistry from the University of Massachusetts and his undergraduate degree from the University of Waterloo. Following graduate school, Jason returned to Ontario and worked in the pharmaceutical industry as a research scientist developing scalable manufacturing processes of active pharmaceutical ingredients.

Dr. Anne Mullin works with leading decision-makers across the health and life sciences sector to amplify the impact of biomedical discoveries and healthcare innovations on the health and wellbeing of populations in both developed and developing countries.

​Anne’s collaborative approach to working with clients and rich academic track record in the study of infectious disease have supported the sustainability and success of numerous international product development consortia, allowed both industry and academic partners to manage risk of high-impact clinical trials, and helped clients from industry, academia and the not-for-profit sector attract capital, establish partnerships and drive innovation. Having led engagements in North America, Europe, Southeast Asia and Africa, Anne’s client base spans the globe.

Monica Taljaard is a Senior Scientist in the Clinical Epidemiology Program at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute (OHRI) and Associate Professor in the School of Epidemiology and Public Health at the University of Ottawa. She received her PhD degree in Epidemiology and Biostatistics at Western University in 2006. Her main research interests are in the design, analysis and ethics of cluster randomized trials. As a methodologist with the Ottawa Methods Centre, she works with clinicians and researchers from a variety of disciplines and medical specialties in the design and analysis of cluster randomized trials, standard clinical trials, and observational studies. She supervises MSc and PhD students in Epidemiology and teaches Biostatistics courses at the University of Ottawa.

Patrick Clifford is currently the Director of Research and Innovation, at the Research Institute of Southlake Regional Health Centre in Newmarket Ontario and CreateIT Now the Southlake owned and operated on campus health innovation centre.  Patrick’s responsibilities include 1/oversight of research operations and infrastructure (including the REB) and 2/ advancing innovation and commercialization activities along with culture building, through strategic collaborations with industry, academia, funders and other key partners. Currently Patrick is charged with leading the development and implementation of Southlake’s research agenda and advancing the innovation and commercialization strategy which includes growing partnerships and collaborations with private sector ventures wishing to test and/or validate wide ranging health focused technologies with Southlake clinicians in an acute care, large community hospital environment. Patrick is also engaged in Southlake’s health sector leadership role in innovative, outcome based, procurement practices. Patrick brings 32 years of health care experience in acute care to his current role. He holds an MSW, a BA, BSW and BEd. and continues to practice as a clinician on a periodic basis in an emergency mental health setting.