About Proteacel

Proteacel is a privately held, early stage biotechnology company that was created in Florida in 2008. Proteacel’s core product, PORE™, is based on proprietary technology that dramatically improves the functionality and performance of the transfection process. The introduction of DNA into foreign cells during transfection is critical to medical research, but is hampered at present by low rates of DNA transfer and high levels of cell death. PORE™ overcomes this bottleneck by supporting higher levels of gene delivery and cell viability. PORE™ is invaluable for research on stem cells and primary cells, both of which are notoriously difficult to transfect but are of great medical relevance.

Proteacel’s initial business activity will revolve around providing transfection services and custom transfected cells. With investigator collaboration, the company intends to broaden its PORE™ technology base for the development of novel products and services aimed at Drug Discovery, Toxicology and Cell Differentiation markets. Proteacel’s long term vision is to leverage PORE™ to develop and co-develop proprietary products, such as human cell lines, therapeutically modified cells, and iPS cells, that will not only improve the spectrum of cell based therapies but also greatly accelerate the discovery process.

Leadership

Joseph G. Zendegui, PhD, President and Chief Operating Officer

Dr. Zendegui has over 22 years experience in the biotechnology industry and has had executive responsibilities in R&D, business development, intellectual property and corporate communications. Dr. Zendegui holds a PhD in Medical Science from the University of South Florida College of Medicine and was a post-doctoral fellow in the Department of Cell Biology, Rockefeller University and the Department of Pharmacology and Howard Hughes Medical Institute at Vanderbilt University. He was past President of Gabriel BioConsulting LLC; Interim Vice President of Business Development at ViRexx Medical Corporation; Vice President, Corporate Development at Chromos Molecular Systems; Director, Business Development at Valentis Inc. (formerly GeneMedicine Inc.); and Associate Director, R&D Projects and Business Development at Triplex Pharmaceutical Corporation.

Robert Lee, Senior VP, Sales and Marketing

Mr. Lee has more than 15 years experience working at the executive level in marketing for the health services industry. He holds an MBA in Marketing & Management from Tulane University’s Freeman School of Business, and a BS in Business Administration from Temple University’s Fox School of Business. Mr. Lee was past President and CEO of Diversified Health Consultants, Inc., and CEO of United Health Care Services, Inc. for long term care facilities and home health care services.

Deepak Agrawal, PhD, Founder and Chief Scientific Advisor

Dr. Agrawal has over 25 years of research experience spanning several scientific disciplines including microbiology, virology, cancer biology, and computational biology. He received his PhD and post-doctoral training at Purdue University before joining the University of South Florida and the Moffitt Cancer Center in 1994. Dr. Agrawal is the scientific founder of Proteacel, the inventor of the PORE™ technology and a member of the faculty at the Moffitt Cancer Center. He established two shared resources for gene expression profiling, a computational laboratory and microarray facility, and currently maintains a research program to examine cell contact induced signal transduction and therapeutically relevant biomarkers in cancer.