Speakers

Julia has been a visionary entrepreneur and strategic brand builder in the veterinary industry for 30+ years. Her achievements include building and scaling two successful start-up veterinary pharmaceutical businesses and launching 28 veterinary products.  She was Founder and CEO of Summit VetPharm, which exited to Ceva Animal Health in 2010.  As Chief Commercial Officer of Aratana Therapeutics (PETX), she was instrumental in the IPO and the buildout of a fully integrated commercial organization.  Julia led the co-promotion and the licensing of Aratana’s lead osteoarthritis product, Galliprant®, to Elanco.  Aratana exited to Elanco in 2019.

Dr Paul Dick D.V.M. M.Sc. obtained his veterinary medical degree with honours in 1984.

While working in clinical practice he completed his Masters in Immunology and Virology transitioning into the Pharmaceutical industry in 1988. Dr. Dick has over 25 years experience in the pharmaceutical space including general management and leadership roles, business development, commercialization, regulatory affairs, and product development encompassing medicinal, non-medicinal and natural health products.

His work in this sector has ranged from small “start up” companies to medium and large multi-nationals functioning in various capacities from research to COO and CEO.

Dr. Dick has worked extensively with Health Canada and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency on numerous regulatory submissions and on several Departmental Committees.

In addition he has been a recipient of the NSERC Synergy Award and has served as a peer reviewer of NSERC strategic grants. He is currently heading his own consulting firm ( Paul Dick and Associates Ltd.) and is the managing partner and president of a venture capital partnership (Vet Venture Capital Inc.).

Dr. Cindy Cole is a Technical Partner at Digitalis Ventures and an Associate Clinical Professor at the University of Florida. Prior to joining Digitalis she was in the animal health industry for many years holding senior leadership and R&D roles at Mars Petcare, Novartis Animal Health, IDEXX, and Piedmont Pharmaceuticals. Dr. Cole completed her DVM and PhD at the University of Florida and was on the faculty of the University of California, Davis and UF.

Dr. Natalie Marks is a small animal veterinarian with over twenty years of clinical experience. She owned the largest animal hospital in Chicago. More recently, she has been the founder and president of MarksDVMConsulting, an educational and strategy consulting firm working with companies of all stages nationally and internationally. She is also on the Executive Committee of VANE, the premier veterinary angel network investor group. VANE currently has 28 portfolio companies and provides direction, connection, and funding to start-ups in the animal health space.