Prashant is a Founder at VRise Therapeutics Inc. He is an accomplished pharma research professional with over 24 years of experience in drug discovery and development research, and a named inventor on multiple novel therapeutics. He has worked to establish many drug development collaborations and has led global partnering activities. Prashant has been instrumental in leading and implementing global scientific and corporate strategies for IP-driven R&D enterprises.

Prashant, as a founding team member at Rhizen, was instrumental in the successful creation and protection of over 500 patents. As part of the key management team, Prashant successfully led several collaboration and out-licensing agreements, including drafting and negotiating deals worth close to USD ~750 mln.

Over the last two decades, Prashant has played a pivotal role in guiding several drug discovery assets at Glenmark and Rhizen. This includes two of the most successful lead candidates, Umbralisib (Licensed to TG Therapeutics Inc and approved by USFDA under the trade name UkoniqTM) and Tenalisib, where he is a named inventor. Tenalisib is licensed to Curon Biopharma for the Greater China Market.

Prashant is a multi-tasker and has closely worked across the entire gamut of drug discovery and clinical development. He is comfortable engaging with all stakeholders including the scientific team, inventors, advisory board members, universities & CROs; licensing partners, external attorneys; and business development teams globally. Over the last two decades, Prashant has acquired both the scientific and management skills in various areas of discovery innovation and has experience spanning research,operations, intellectual property, legal, strategy, business development. He also a named inventor on over 10 inventions.

He started his drug discovery career with Torrent in 1999 and holds a M.Pharm. in Medicinal Chemistry from Birla Institute of Technology (BITS, MESRA) and a Post graduate degree in Intellectual Property Management (NMIMS, Mumbai). He also holds a Law Degree (Pune University) and is a registered patent agent.