Dr. Francesco De Rubertis is Chairman of the Board at Centessa Pharmaceuticals and a co-founder and partner at Medicxi.
Prior to Medicxi, Francesco was a partner at Index Ventures for 19 years, having joined the firm in 1997 to launch its life sciences practice. Under his leadership, the asset-centric approach to life sciences investing was conceived and adopted.
Francesco’s prior investments include Cellzome (acquired by GlaxoSmithKline, PLC), Genmab (Copenhagen: GEN.CO), GenSight Biologics (Euronext: SIGHT), Micromet (acquired by Amgen), Minerva Neurosciences (NASDAQ: NERV), Molecular Partners (Swiss: MOLN.SW), PanGenetics (acquired by Abbott), ParAllele Bioscience (acquired by Affymetrix), ProFibrix (acquired by The Medicines Company), and Versartis (NASDAQ: VSAR).
Francesco received a BA in genetics and microbiology from the University of Pavia in Italy and a PhD in molecular biology from the University of Geneva in Switzerland after which he became a postdoctoral scientist at the Whitehead Institute at MIT. He is a chartered financial analyst and serves on the main board of the University of Geneva.
In November 2017, Francesco was named in the first “Bloomberg 50” as one of the top 50 entrepreneurs and innovators who helped to define global business in 2017.
Francesco also serves on the board of Rivus Pharmaceuticals.
