Joel Barrish is currently a Venture Partner at RA Ventures focusing on new company creation in Biotech. Prior to joining RAVen, Joel was co-founder, President and Chief Scientific Officer at Jnana Therapeutics, a clinical stage, small molecule platform company focused on unlocking hard-to-drug targets in Immunology and Oncology, as well as rare diseases such as PKU. His first role in Biotech was as Executive Vice President and Chief Scientific Officer at Achillion Pharmaceuticals, where he led research efforts on Factor D inhibitors leading to the discovery of vemircopan in hematology and nephrology. Most of Joel’s career was spent as a medicinal chemist in pharma, where he capped a 28-year career at Bristol-Myers Squibb by spending the last five years as Vice President and Global Head of Discovery Chemistry, working across all therapeutic areas. During his time at BMS, Joel led teams responsible for advancing more than 50 compounds into clinical development. In particular, he and his colleagues made notable advances in kinase inhibitor drug discovery, especially in oncology and immunology, leading to the discovery of SPRYCEL® (dasatinib) in CML which he co-invented, as well as SOTYKTU® (deucravacitinib) for the treatment of autoimmune diseases. Joel was also a key contributor to Endothelin Receptor research and was instrumental in developing the Dual-Acting endothelin angiotensin Receptor Antagonist (DARA) concept which resulted in FILSPARI® (sparsentan) for the treatment of IgA Nephropathy. He is a co-author on over 140 publications and is a co-inventor on 40 issued U.S. patents. Prior to moving to BMS, he was a research scientist at Hoffmann La-Roche. Joel received his doctorate in Organic Chemistry from Columbia University and his bachelor’s degree in Chemistry from the University of Pennsylvania.
