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RainDance Technologies Appoints Alan Sherr as Vice President and Chief Intellectual Property Counsel
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Sherr to Lead the Growth and Management of RainDance’s Foundational IP Portfolio Centered on the Company’s Disruptive Microdroplet Platform Technology
Lexington, MA -- RainDance Technologies, Inc., a private company pioneering microdroplet-based technologies for single-molecule and single-cell analysis, today announced the appointment of Alan Sherr as Vice President and Chief Intellectual Property Counsel.
Mr. Sherr brings 30 years of experience in regulatory, corporate, and intellectual property (IP) law, including deep experience in life science tools and diagnostics to RainDance. He previously served as Vice President, Chief Intellectual Property Counsel at Helicos BioSciences. From 2000 to 2007, Mr. Sherr was Senior IP Counsel and Vice President of Licensing at Affymetrix. From 1990 to 2000, Mr. Sherr was an attorney in private practice with leading intellectual property and general corporate law firms including Wolf, Greenfield, and Sacks and Hale and Dorr. Prior to that, he was General Counsel to the Massachusetts Executive Office of Human Services, and a Massachusetts Assistant Attorney General. He holds a J.D. from Boston University, an MSEE from Stanford University, and a BSEE from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
“Alan’s tremendous track record in growing, prosecuting, and defending foundational patent estates for transformational platform technologies and high-growth tools and diagnostics companies will be incredibly valuable as we continue to develop the RainDance intellectual property portfolio,” said Roopom Banerjee, President and CEO of RainDance Technologies. “This appointment reflects our commitment and investment to protect and grow our leading patent portfolio for microdroplet-based technologies across a broad range of genomic, protein and cell-based applications.”
Mr. Sherr will also lead RainDance’s intellectual property strategy with respect to licensing partnerships and strategic collaborations, and will play a central role in the pursuit of innovative future applications for the Company’s microdroplet technology. Today, RainDance holds approximately 70 issued and/or pending patents and 400 in-licensed patents worldwide.
Michael W. Hunkapiller, General Partner at Alloy Ventures and Director at RainDance added, “Since its inception in 2004, RainDance has compiled an early and broad global patent portfolio for the application of microdroplet technologies in the life sciences. The Company’s current commercial applications in PCR-based targeted resequencing validation and sequence enrichment are unique and well protected. The Company is also well positioned to pursue novel applications in PCR and single cell analysis. We are excited to welcome Alan to lead the next phase of growth and management of RainDance’s IP portfolio.”
“RainDance has amassed an extraordinary base of home-grown and in-licensed patents, and I look forward to strengthening that position as the company addresses the needs of researchers at the leading edge of the revolution in personalized medicine," said Mr. Sherr. “I am excited to be joining in this role at an important inflection point in the Company’s growth.”
About RainDance Technologies
RainDance Technologies provides novel microdroplet-based solutions that accelerate breakthroughs in disease research, human healthcare and industrial markets. RainDance’s proprietary technology platform delivers exquisite sensitivity and data quality that inspires scientists, researchers and clinicians to rethink the way they design experiments, approach discovery, or conduct clinical care. The core RainStorm™ technology empowers customers to conduct de novo science in an ultra high throughput, simple, flexible, and low cost manner. The company provides resolution of molecular, biological and physiological events from large population samples to unprecedented single cell analysis, all inside a contained droplet microenvironment that enables quantification, single molecule sensitivity, and preserves sample integrity with no bias or contamination. RainDance’s commercial products include instruments and high-value consumables and reagents for targeted
resequencing validation and sequence enrichment for next-generation sequencing, ultra-deep sequencing, and methylation analysis. RainDance sells directly in the U.S. and in Europe, and is building distribution networks in Europe and Asia-Pacific. RainDance Technologies, with headquarters in Lexington, MA and a European sales office in the United Kingdom, has approximately 70 employees worldwide.
For more information, please visit www.raindancetech.com.
RainStorm is a trademark of RainDance Technologies, Inc.
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