J.P. Morgan Life Sciences Private Capital, which is the life sciences venture and growth equity arm within J.P. Morgan Asset Management, announced the appointment of Dashyant (Dash) Dhanak, Ph.D., as Venture Partner. Dr. Dhanak will utilize his deep scientific and operational experience in therapeutics research and development to build and grow companies with Life Sciences Private Capital.
Work experience: Dr. Dhanak is a seasoned pharmaceutical research and development expert with 30+ years of experience. And most recently, Dr. Dhanak was the Chief Scientific Officer at Deciphera Pharmaceuticals, which was bought by Ono Pharmaceuticals in 2024 for $2.4 billion. Before his role at Deciphera, Dr. Dhanak served as Chief Scientific Officer at Incyte, where he was responsible for overseeing the research and preclinical development of innovative medicines across the company’s hematology, oncology, and immunology franchises. During his time at Incyte, he contributed significantly to the filing of over 15 Investigational New Drug (IND) applications. Before joining Incyte in 2018, Dr. Dhanak was Vice President and Global Head of Discovery Sciences at Johnson & Johnson’s (J&J) Janssen Research & Development group. Before J&J, he spent 25 years at GlaxoSmithKline.
Education: Dr. Dhanak holds a B.Sc. in Chemistry from the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology and a Ph.D. from the University of London. And he completed his postdoctoral research in Natural Product Synthesis at Northwestern University.
KEY QUOTE:
“Dr. Dhanak has a proven track record of building and establishing leading biotech companies with scientific and operational excellence. We are excited to welcome Dr. Dhanak to the team, and know he will play an essential role as our platform continues to grow.”
Dr. Stephen Squinto, CIO of Life Sciences Private Capital
