Marijn E. Dekkers is founder and chairman of Novalis LifeSciences LLC, an investment and advisory firm for the Life Science industry that he founded in 2017.

From 2010-2016, Dr. Dekkers served as CEO of Bayer AG in Leverkusen, Germany. From 2002-2009, he was CEO of Thermo Fisher Scientific in Waltham, MA, USA. He started his career in 1985 as a research scientist at General Electric’s Corporate R&D Center in Niskayuna, NY, USA.

Dr. Dekkers received his PhD and M.S. in Chemical Engineering from the University of Eindhoven and his B.S in chemistry from the Radboud University, both in the Netherlands. He holds dual U.S. and Dutch citizenship.

Mr Tillmann has 25 years of experience in senior executive positions and  co-founded Helaxy with the vision to make NGS accessible for everyone.

In 2010 he founded Amatargroup, an incubator for healthcare companies. As one portfolio company he founded and managed as CEO the NGS company Vela Diagnostics, which was acquired by Luye Lifescience Group.

Prior to that, Mr. Tillmann served as President &  CEO for Roche Diagnostics in North America and before that in Asia Pacific and Europe. 
Mr Tillmann’s first Diagnostic engagement was as Managing Director of artus GmbH, which was later acquired by Qiagen.

Mr Tillmann started his career in the pharmaceutical trading house, Holstein GmbH, as Managing Director, in Hong Kong and Japan.

He holds a Diploma in International Management from the University of Hamburg.

Mr. Ng co-founded Helaxy with the vision of simplifying molecular NGS based testing and making it easily adopted in routine in hospitals and clinics

Previously he was Director of Engineering with Vela Diagnostics where he pivoted the development of Vela Diagnostic’s IVD platform and integration with molecular diagnostics assays 

Before joining Vela Diagnostics, Mr. Ng is with Applied Biosystems (now part of ThermoFisher Scientific) as a systems integration engineer. 

Mr. Ng has a Bachelor Degree in Bioengineering (Hons.) from the National University of Singapore.

Gerd Michel, PhD, has more than 30 years experience in developing and implementing new products in molecular diagnostics, immunodiagnostics and point of care testing.    After several years in the private laboratory sector he spent most of his career at Abbott Laboratories holding various senior management positions, among them the company’s Scientific Director for Europe, Middle East & Africa. 
He developed numerous commercially successful diagnostic products, mainly in the field of infectious diseases.

Most recently he was VP and CSO of Vela Diagnostics, focusing on DNA sequencing. Among other products this company developed a novel HIV drug resistance assay, approved by the FDA in 2019.
 
He has served at a number of technology advisory and grant selection committees at international NGOs, e.g. The Wellcome Trust, Global Health Innovation Technology Fund, WHO, and the OECD. He also served at the German National Blood Advisory Board for 5 years.