TEAM

Thomas Butler

Co-Founder and Managing Partner​

Thomas Butler is a Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Nutide Ventures, where he focuses on both private company investing and the creation of new companies, with a particular emphasis on biotech and digital health technologies. Thomas is an accomplished biotechnology leader with a proven track record of founding and scaling clinical-stage biopharmaceutical companies.​

Prior to founding Nutide, Thomas was the co-founder, Chief Executive Officer, and Chairman of the Board of Biomea Fusion, Inc., where he built the company from the ground up as employee number one. He led the company for 8 years from Lead Identification to Candidate Selection to IND-enabling studies, three funding (up) rounds including a $350M raise, and five clinical trials across 300+ patients. He built Biomea Fusion into an innovative covalent based Drug Discovery and Development company with a first-class team of biotech professionals to execute on at least three key programs. That included icovamenib (BMF-219), a first-in-class menin inhibitor for diabetes and oncology, BMF-500, a covalent FLT3 inhibitor, as well as a potential best in class small molecule, oral, GLP-1 agonist, BMF-650.​

Prior to founding Biomea Fusion in 2017, Thomas co-founded Point Sur Investors, a long-only biotech investment fund focused solely on innovative therapies that significantly improve the standard of care where he served as Managing Partner. Before forming Point Sur Investors, Thomas managed Investor Relations at Pharmacyclics Inc., where he helped grow the company from a market cap of $6.74B to over $21B, which included the execution of one of the largest biotech acquisitions to date. Prior to Pharmacyclics, Inc., Thomas spent 6 years as a medicinal chemist at Gilead Sciences Inc. engaging in novel drug design and drug development of HCV polymerase and protease inhibitors. Thomas is the co-inventor of VEKLURY (Remdesivir), a polymerase inhibitor for the treatment of COVID-19 infection. Remdesivir generated revenue in 2021 of $5.6B.​

Thomas holds an MBA from the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) and a master’s degree in Organic Chemistry from the University of California Santa Barbara (UCSB). As a research scientist, Thomas has been awarded numerous patents in the US and internationally, as well as published in top academic journals such as the American Chemical Society Journal of Medicinal Chemistry and Angewandte Chemie.​

Thanaa Makdsi​

Co-Founder and Managing Partner​

Thanaa Makdsi is a Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Nutide Ventures, where she focuses on both private company investing and the creation of new companies, with a emphasis on biotech and digital health technologies. Thanaa is an accomplished biotech professional with experience spanning finance, investing, sell-side equity research, corporate development, and investor relations across the biotech sector.

Prior to founding Nutide, Thanaa served as Associate Director of Investor Relations at ACELYRIN, where she led efforts to identify and engage new investors, analyze market dynamics in inflammatory diseases, and support the overall investor and analyst communications strategy. She previously held corporate development and investor relations roles at Senti Biosciences, where she supported a $296 million fundraising and public listing, along with ongoing investor relations and business development initiatives.

Earlier in her career, Thanaa was a sell-side equity research associate at Wedbush Securities, covering public and private biotech companies across neurology and nephrology, and evaluating development strategies and competitive positioning. She also served as a buy-side equity research analyst at Point Sur Investors, conducting fundamental analysis of small- and mid-cap biotech companies across multiple therapeutic areas. There, she helped shape the development strategy for a public biotech company leading to a $26 million raise and supported the early operations of portfolio company Biomea Fusion.

Thanaa is passionate about accelerating programs and companies that improve the lives of patients with rare diseases, metabolic disorders, endocrine disorders, and cancer. She was previously a fellow at No Patient Left Behind, a non-profit organization advocating for healthcare reforms that support innovation and affordable medicines.

She holds a BS in Finance with honors and a minor in Applied Computing from San Jose State University.

Ravi Upasani

IP Strategy

Ravi Upasani, Ph.D. brings over three decades of experience spanning drug discovery and intellectual property management across the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries. Trained as a small molecule chemist, Ravi combines a deep understanding of medicinal chemistry and structure–activity relationships with extensive expertise in global patent strategy and portfolio development.

Prior to joining Nutide, Ravi served as Executive Vice President of Intellectual Property at Biomea Fusion, where he built and led the company’s IP function, developing and executing comprehensive strategies to protect its covalent chemistry platform and clinical-stage oncology and metabolic programs. His leadership encompassed the creation and prosecution of foundational patent families, competitive landscape assessments, and IP diligence.

Prior to Biomea Fusion, Ravi held senior intellectual property positions at Protagonist Therapeutics, Pharmacyclics, Evotec, and Renovis, where he directed patent strategies across diverse therapeutic areas including oncology, inflammation, CNS disorders, and metabolic diseases. Over the course of his career, he has contributed to multiple IND-enabling programs and clinical candidates, guiding the integration of scientific innovation with robust IP protection to support long-term value creation.

Ravi is a registered U.S. Patent Agent with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). He has authored more than 35 scientific publications and is listed as an inventor on over 15 U.S. patents, reflecting both his technical depth in medicinal chemistry and his strategic acumen in intellectual property management.

Johannes Voigt

Computational Science

Johannes H. Voigt, Ph.D. is a computational chemistry and research informatics expert with more than two decades of applying advanced computational methods to accelerate small-molecule drug discovery. He integrates molecular modeling, cheminformatics, and artificial intelligence to solve complex discovery challenges and guide the design of novel therapeutics.

His expertise spans virtual screening, structure- and ligand-based design, protein–ligand interaction simulations, and free energy perturbation approaches, with specialized focus on the rational design of covalent inhibitors and bifunctional degraders (PROTACs). Johannes also has extensive experience in research informatics—building data integration pipelines and predictive modeling frameworks to support multidisciplinary discovery teams.

Previously, Johannes served as Executive Director of Computational Chemistry at Biomea Fusion, where he led the computational function supporting the company’s covalent chemistry platform and oncology and metabolic disease programs. Before that, he held senior computational chemistry roles at Totus Medicines, Foghorn Therapeutics, Gilead Sciences, and Merck/Schering-Plough, contributing to discovery programs across oncology, epigenetics, neuroscience and metabolic disorders.

Johannes earned his Ph.D. in Synthetic Organic Chemistry from Göttingen University, Germany, and is recognized for bridging experimental and computational sciences to enable data-driven discovery and optimize molecular design.

Sheldon Wang

Drug Design

Sheldon Wang, M.S., is a seasoned medicinal chemist with three decades of experience in small molecule drug discovery, design, and project leadership across multiple therapeutic areas, including metabolic diseases, oncology, and cardiovascular disorders.

Sheldon earned his B.S. and M.S. in Inorganic Chemistry from Beijing Normal University, followed by a second M.S. in Organic Chemistry from the University of Memphis in 1994.  He began his industrial career soon after and has since contributed to drug discovery programs for 20 years at several leading pharmaceutical companies, including AbbVie (formerly Abbott Laboratories), Eli Lilly, and Amgen.  Throughout his career, Sheldon has played critical roles in advancing discovery projects from early concept to clinical candidate selection.  He is the co-inventor of Evacetrapib (LY2484595, a CETP inhibitor) and Azelaprog (AMG986, an Apelin receptor agonist), both of which exemplify his expertise in medicinal chemistry.  His scientific contributions are reflected in 58 publications and patents.

Prior to joining Nutide, Sheldon led key chemistry efforts at Biomea Fusion where he oversaw external collaborations and cross-functional discovery efforts spanning chemistry, DMPK, in vitro biology, and in vivo pharmacology. These efforts resulted in two successful small-molecule clinical candidates, BMF-500 and BMF-650, reflecting his ability to combine deep scientific insight with strategic execution.

Sheldon is recognized for his strategic approach to drug design, deep understanding of medicinal chemistry principles, and ability to translate complex data into actionable research direction.  His collaborative mindset and experience of working with CRO partners have allowed him to build and manage effective discovery teams, driving innovation efficiently and cost-effectively.

With a proven record of scientific achievement and leadership, Sheldon continues to bring creativity, rigor, and strategic vision to early-stage drug discovery and development.

Sonali Upasani

Communications & Investor Relations

Ketaki “Sonali” Upasani supports communications and investor relations initiatives as an intern at Nutide Ventures, contributing to the firm’s branding, investor relations and communications efforts.

Sonali brings hands-on experience in communications strategy, digital media, and visual storytelling, having developed content and campaigns that highlight innovation, education, and social impact.

She earned her B.A. in Communication Studies from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and is currently pursuing an M.S. in Strategic Communication at Columbia University, further deepening her expertise in strategic messaging, brand positioning, and investor-focused communications.