Brian Riley

Chief Manufacturing Officer, Beam Therapeutics

Brian Riley, an experienced leader in operations, quality, and manufacturing is Chief Manufacturing Officer at Beam. Prior to Beam, Mr. Riley spent five years at Catalent Pharma Solutions, initially as General Manager, Biologics and most recently as the Vice President of Operations. There, he helped to cultivate the company’s biologics business, managing five biologics plants supporting the company’s drug substance and products across North America and Europe. Prior to Catalent, Mr. Riley served as the Site Director of Durham, NC operations at bioMerieux, where he led both the company’s compliance remediation effort and global growth platform. Before bioMerieux, Mr. Riley held progressive roles through quality and operations at Biogen Idec, Amgen and Diosynth Biotechnology.

Mr. Riley holds an MBA from Campbell University and a B.S. from North Carolina State University.

Brian Stamper

VP, Cell Therapy Operations Immunomic therapeutics, Inc.

Mr. Brian Stamper joined Immunomic Therapeutics, Inc. in June 2022 as Vice President, Cell Therapy Operations. Mr. Stamper has over 20 years of experience in the biopharmaceutical industry, including increasingly responsible management positions in various operational areas including cell therapy operations, biotechnology manufacturing, and process engineering.

Mr. Stamper was most recently Sr. Director, Manufacturing at Kite Pharma, a global biopharmaceutical company whose focus is cell therapy to treat and cure cancer. In addition to his over three years with Kite Pharma, Mr. Stamper has held positions of increasing responsibility at Lonza Pharmaceuticals and Biotechnology, AstraZeneca Biologics, and Eli Lilly & Company. Mr. Stamper holds a Master of Biotechnology Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Degree (MBEE) from Johns Hopkins University, a Master of Science Degree in Biologics Engineering from Purdue University and a Bachelor of Science Degree in Biochemistry from Indiana University.

Jim Watson

VP, Project Farma

Jim Watson has 25+ years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry. He is a Vice President at Project Farma, has led development of Project Farma’s presence in the East Coast, and has been a leader on its cell and gene therapy task force. He started his career designing, building, and starting up membrane plants, to eventually managing large-scale capital projects and leading engineering, maintenance, capital projects, and EHS disciplines at a leading CMO. Jim has extensive experience in high-purity utilities, large molecule biological processes, and advanced therapies. He has worked for small and established pharmaceutical and biotech organizations launching early phase manufacturing strategy, conceptual design, user requirement specifications, verification, validation, facility turnover, and facility operations. Jim graduated with a BS in Chemical Engineering from Worcester Polytechnic Institute and is completing an MBA through the University of Central Oklahoma.

Chad Salisbury

Senior Vice President, Project Farma

Chad Salisbury joined Project Farma in October 2022 as Senior Vice President. Chad has over 20 years of experience encompassing gene therapy, vaccines, sterile injectables, and small molecules, including the delivery of ~$2B USD of greenfield cGMP manufacturing facilities. Chad has held increasingly responsible management positions in manufacturing, quality, engineering, and supply chain.

Chad was most recently VP, of Manufacturing at Affinia Therapeutics, a company singularly focused on using innovations in gene therapy to lead the fight against devastating rare and prevalent diseases. Prior to Affinia, Chad held progressive roles at CSL Seqirus, Novartis, and Eli Lilly in both the US and Europe.

Chad holds an MBA from Purdue University, an MEM from Duke University, and a B.A. from Alfred University.

Charlie Harper

Vice President, Project Farma

Charlie Harper joined Project Farma in October 2022 as Vice President. Charlie has over 25 years of experience encompassing gene therapy, microbiome, vaccines, and sterile injectables including four facility startups and the completion of a consent decree workplan. Charlie has held positions of increasing management responsibility across TechOps/CMC including roles in manufacturing, quality, supply chain and program management.

Most recently, Charlie was the VP, Manufacturing and Supply Chain at Intergalactic Therapeutics, a company focused developing a best-in-class non-viral gene therapy to overcome the limitations of viral-based gene therapy. Prior to Intergalactic, Charlie held progressive roles at Voyager Therapeutics, Seres Therapeutics, Sanofi/Genzyme, GlobeImmune and Amgen.

Charlie holds an MBA from the University of Denver and a B.S. in Biology from Baylor University.