UP FRONT
amazing hematologists: Dr. Schwartz and
Jane Desforges, MD, a former president
of the American Society of Hematology.
She was a brilliant and compassionate
physician and teacher. Eventually, as she
retired, I took over most of her practice.
It was a true honor to know both Drs.
Schwartz and Desforges as incredible
hematologists and mentors.
After beginning your career
in academic medicine, what
prompted you to join the
pharmaceutical industry?
I think of academic medicine as the first
segment in my three-part career so far.
I stayed on the academic faculty at Tufts
for 13 years. I had a busy malignant
hematology practice. This included at-
tending responsibilities on the bone mar-
row transplant and leukemia services,
maintaining a small research lab, and
teaching responsibilities at the medical
school. Eventually, I became head of the
Tufts Cancer Center.
At that point, I thought that I would
spend the rest of my career in academic
medicine. But, in 2000, I ended up meet-
ing the CEO of Millennium Pharmaceu-
ticals, a biotechnology company based in
Cambridge. Two things happened around
this time: One was a general recognition
that what makes me tick as a physician is
my love of taking care of patients, but also
a realization that I was only able to reach
one patient or family at a time. The avail-
able medicines weren’t making the kind of
impact that I thought we needed.
On the industry side, there was growing
excitement about the quality of research and
the academicians moving to that world. I
realized that if I could help shepherd a medi-
cine to approval, I could potentially help tens
or hundreds of thousands of patients around
the world. I was ready for a change that
would allow me to boost my impact factor.
So, in January 2001, I became the
company’s first head of oncology. I spent
nearly 19 years in the pharmaceutical
industry, which included five years
running oncology drug development at
Millennium and bringing bortezomib
to market, helping to change the way
we treat multiple myeloma. From there,
I was recruited to run all of cancer
medicine at Genentech out in California.
During this time, I still saw patients one
day a week, as I was able to also hold
positions at Tufts, and then at Stanford.
After Roche bought Genentech in
2009, I decided that I didn’t want to stay
with a big company. Around this time, I
heard about Agios, a startup in Boston
that was looking at the metabolic path-
ways of cancer cells. So I went back to
the East Coast and joined a handful of
employees as the first CEO of Agios. Dur-
ing my 10-year tenure there, I oversaw
the discovery and development of two
important medicines approved for acute
myeloid leukemia (AML) – ivosidenib and
ASHClinicalNews.org
enasidenib – and a host
of other exciting investi-
gational products.
If pharma was the
second stage, what
is the third stage of
your career?
Four months ago, I
stepped away as CEO to
become executive chair
of the board of direc-
tors at Agios. During
this time, I took on a
new role as a general
partner at GV (formerly
Google Ventures), where
I colead the life sciences
investment team. We’re
focused on investing in
the next-wave life sci-
ence companies that
could have a huge impact
on patients’ lives. It’s
early, so I’m still figuring
everything out, but so
far, it’s been incredibly
exciting.
Dr. Schenkein with his son (left) in New York City.
Do you ever think
about going back to
academic medicine full time?
When I was in the biotechnology industry,
I was offered some significant leadership
roles in academic institutions, and I seri-
ously considered them. But I think what
kept me from taking those was, again,
the ability to make a bigger impact on the
industry side. I’m now seeing a whole new
wave of companies on the GV side that
have enormous potential for impact.
What did you learn from your
experiences in industry that you
couldn’t learn in academia?
When I went through medical school
and training, no one really spent time
training us how to be leaders. We were
being trained as physicians, period. Some
physicians grow up to become leaders
of institutions, and some are great, and
some are not so great. On the industry
side, however, the leadership spends time
on developing whatever your expertise is
– whether you’re a chemist or a drug de-
veloper – and there is a lot of opportunity
to grow as a leader. Now, we are seeing
more industry leaders going back into
leadership roles in academia; I think that
experience is very helpful.
What would you tell a trainee or
physician who is thinking about
moving from academic medicine
to industry?
The biggest predictor of how well you will do
is how humble you are. Patient care usually
is more of an individual sport, but industry
is a team sport, so you have to leave your ego
at the door and play on a team.
Throughout each phase of your
career, what accomplishments
are you most proud of? On the
flip side, are there any major
disappointments?
I’ve been fortunate to be involved in many
things that have turned out well. I’ve always
said that my two proudest accomplishments
are our children; they are in their 30s now
and are fantastic humans.
On the career side, it’s difficult to find a
greater sense of accomplishment than car-
ing for a very sick patient and being able
to put his or her disease into remission or
hopefully even cure it. Thinking about the
achievements that have had the greatest
impact on medicine, I am proud of the
two recent approvals from Agios. With
the other companies I was involved in, the
drugs were already in some stage of de-
velopment. At Agios, I was involved from
the very beginning – from discovering and
validating the target, to developing the
medicine, conducting clinical trials, get-
ting approval, and launching the product.
I think these products are going to change
the way we think about treating AML.
I’d say the biggest disappointments in
my full-time medicine days were when
patients didn’t do well and their disease
eventually won out. It’s always disappoint-
ing because you just wish you could have
done more.
And yes, there are disappointments in
drug development all the time. To handle
those, we look for the lessons learned. Just
like we have morbidity and mortality con-
ferences in medicine, we discuss what went
well, what didn’t go well, and what we could
do differently with the next medicine.
You mentioned having two kids –
did either of them follow in your
footsteps into medicine?
Our son is 33 and works for a big video
game company in New York, and our
daughter is 31 and has been in a re-
search lab at Memorial Sloan Kettering
for a long time. She is now working on
a master’s degree in public health at
Columbia University. They both grew up
in Massachusetts, but somehow, they both
ended up in New York.
What do you do when you’re not
working?
I work from GV’s Boston office, so it’s nice
being on the East Coast again and closer
to the kids. Spending time with family
is great, and sports have always played a
major role in my life. I’ve always played
racquet sports. I played both competitive
tennis and squash during school and was
a nationally ranked squash player in medi-
cal school. I still play squash about once a
week, but more recently I’ve taken up run-
ning. I’m not quite sure why, but it’s easy;
you just put your sneakers on and go.
Who is your dream dinner party
guest?
The name that keeps popping into my
head is John Lennon. I grew up in the late
’60s and early ’70s as a huge Beatles fan. I
was fascinated by not only the music, but
his passion for peace and love. I wouldn’t
have anything specific to ask. I’d sit, listen,
and be amazed. ●
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