Non-Executive Directors
The Board of Directors governs Aptorum Group in accordance with its vision, mission and values. Aptorum’s directors have extensive medical, governance and financial experience and relationships throughout the healthcare industry. The role of the Board of Directors is to ensure that the company is well managed by having its units fulfilling their roles and responsibilities.
Mr. Charles Bathurst is an Independent Non-Executive Director of Aptorum Group Limited, chairman of the Audit Committee and a member of the both the Remuneration and Policies and Procedures committees. Mr. Bathurst has over 45 years’ experience of management and senior executive roles across the financial services, technology and healthcare industries. In 2011, he set up his own independent consultancy service, Summerhill Advisors Limited, advising on management structure, business development, financial reporting, internal audit controls and compliance to both emerging and multinational companies. Today he holds Non-Executive and Advisory board positions on fast-growing companies in healthcare, technology and financial services. Prior to establishing Summerhill, Mr. Bathurst served as a Director for J.O. Hambro Investment Management from September 2008 to August 2011, where he oversaw the restructuring and commercialisation of a range of in-house investment funds. He was appointed to the management board and supervised reporting teams including Business development, accounting, regulatory reporting and internal controls. From April 2004 to March 2008, Mr. Bathurst served in multiple roles at Old Mutual Asset Managers (UK), including being a member of the senior management team and head of international sales. Duties included business development, launching new investment funds, recruitment, establishing and supervision of regulatory and financial reporting teams, as well as ensuring compliance with funds' regulatory requirements and corporate governance standards. Prior to this, Mr. Bathurst was an advisor to Lion Capital Advisors Limited from April 2003 to March 2004, an early stage VC fund manager and business development consultant reporting to the board of management of LCF Rothschild Asset Management Limited. From April 1995 to March 2002, Mr. Bathurst joined a newly formed alternative investment management team at Credit Agricole Asset Management, establishing the London Branch as the Managing Director in 1998. He was responsible for the recruitment and development strategy for marketing, sales, investment, financial reporting, compliance and regulatory controls and investor relations. Between the period of September 1989 and December 1994, Mr. Bathurst worked for GNI, the largest futures and options execution and clearing broker on the London International Financial Futures Exchange, where he focused on marketing to European and Middle East financial institutions. In 1991, he joined a new management team to launch a series of specialist investment funds while serving as the Head of Sales and Product Development. Mr. Bathurst graduated from the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in November 1974 and commissioned into the British Army serving in the UK and Germany.
Dr. Mirko Scherer is an Independent Non-Executive Director of Aptorum Group Limited. Dr. Scherer has been serving as the Chief Executive Officer at CoFeS China (formerly known as “TVM Capital China”) in Hong Kong since March 2015. and as president of CoFes France Since June 2019. CoFeS focuses on cross-border activities in the life science industry between China and the West. It acts as a bridge between China and the West, assisting Chinese investors and pharmaceutical companies accessing western innovations, while collaborating with innovative life science companies from the West to enter the fast-growing China market. Dr. Mirko Scherer has served on the Board of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange from 2005 to 2007 and has been a board member of the Stichting Preferente Aandelen QIAGEN from 2004 to 2019. From August 2016 through July 2018, Dr. Scherer served as a Non-Executive board member of Quantapore Inc. and from April 2015 through September 2017, he was a director of China BioPharma Capital I, (GP). Dr. Scherer is an experienced biotechnology executive and has led numerous financing M&A and licensing transactions, in both public and private markets, in Europe and the U.S. for over 20 years. He consulted MPM Capital for the period between July 2012 and December 2014. Dr. Scherer was also a co-founder and partner of KI Kapital from November 2008 to February 2014, a company which was specialized in providing consultation in life science industry. Prior to working in the venture capital industry, Dr. Scherer co-founded GPC Biotech (Munich and Princeton, NJ) and served as the Chief Financial Officer from October 1997 to December 2007. GPC Biotech engaged in numerous pharmaceutical alliances with companies such as Sanofi Aventis, Boehringer Ingelheim, Altana (now part of Takeda), Yakult, and Pharmion (now part of Celgene). Over the past 20 years, Dr. Scherer has established an extensive network in the U.S., European, and China’s biotechnology and venture capital industry. Prior to his time at GPC Biotech, Dr. Scherer worked as a consultant from May 1993 to June 1994 at the Boston Consulting Group. Dr. Scherer earned a Doctorate in Finance from the European Business School in Oestrich-Winkel/Germany in 1998, a MBA from Harvard Business School in June 1996, and a degree in Business Administration from the University of Mannheim/Germany in February 1993.
Professor Justin Wu is an Independent Non-Executive Director of Aptorum Group Limited. He also has been serving as the Chief Operating Officer of CUHK Medical Centre since August 2018. He served as the Associate Dean (Development) of the Faculty of Medicine at CUHK from July 2014 to June 2018 and the Associate Dean (Clinical) of the Faculty of Medicine at CUHK from December 2012 to July 2014, and has been serving a Professor in the Department of Medicine and Therapeutics since 2009, also the Director of the S. H. Ho Center for Digestive Health, a research center specializing in functional gastrointestinal diseases, reflux and motility disorders, and digestive endoscopy. Active in research publications and assessments, Dr. Wu served as the International Associate Editor of American Journal of Gastroenterology (“AJG”), and Managing Editor of Journal of Gastroenterology and Hepatology (“JGH”). He is also the Scientific Committee Chairman of the Asian Neurogastroenterology and Motility Association (“ANMA”), and Secretary General of the Asia Pacific Association of Gastroenterology (“APAGE”). Professor Wu has won a number of awards including the Emerging Leader in Gastroenterology Award by the JGH Foundation, and the Vice Chancellor’s Exemplary Teaching Award at CUHK. Aside from his expertise in gastroenterology, Professor Wu has an extensive interest in the development of Integrative Medicine in Hong Kong. He is the Founding Director of the Hong Kong Institute of Integrative Medicine, working closely with the School of Chinese Medicine to develop an integrative model at an international level. The institute aims at maximizing the strength of Western and Chinese medicine to provide a safe and effective integrative treatment to patients. Professor Wu served as a consultant and an advisory board member for Takeda Pharmaceutical, AstraZeneca, Menarini, Reckitt Benckiser and Abbott Laboratory. He earned his Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery Degree (1993), and his Doctor of Medicine Degree (2000) from CUHK. Additionally, he attained Fellowships of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh and London in 2007 and 2012 respectively, Fellowship of the Hong Kong College of Physicians in 2002, Fellowship of the Hong Kong Academy of Medicine in 2002, and has been an American Gastroenterological Association Fellow since 2012.
Professor Douglas W. Arner is an Independent Non-Executive Director of Aptorum Group Limited. Douglas is the Kerry Holdings Professor in Law and Director and co-founder of the Asian Institute of International Financial Law at the University of Hong Kong, as well as Faculty Director and co-founder of the LLM in Compliance and Regulation, LLM in Corporate and Financial Law, and Law, Innovation, Technology and Entrepreneurship (LITE) Programmes. He served as Head of the HKU Department of Law from 2011 to 2014 and as Co-Director of the Duke University-HKU Asia-America Institute in Transnational Law from 2005 to 2016. Douglas has published eighteen books and more than 200 articles, chapters and reports on international financial law and regulation, most recently Reconceptualising Global Finance and its Regulation (Cambridge 2016) (with Ross Buckley and Emilios Avgouleas) and The RegTech Book (Wiley 2019) (Janos Barberis and Ross Buckley). His recent papers are available on SSRN at https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=524849 , where he is among the top 75 authors in the world by total downloads. Douglas led the development of Introduction to FinTech – launched with edX in May 2018 and now with over 80,000 learners spanning the world – and the foundation of the edx-HKU Online Professional Certificate in FinTech. He is a Senior Visiting Fellow of Melbourne Law School, University of Melbourne, a non-executive director of NASDAQ and Euronext listed Aptorum Group and an Advisory Board Member of the Centre for Finance, Technology and Entrepreneurship (CFTE). Douglas was an inaugural member of the Hong Kong Financial Services Development Council (2013-2019) and has served as a consultant with, among others, the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, APEC, Alliance for Financial Inclusion, and European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. He has lectured, co-organised conferences and seminars and been involved with financial sector reform projects around the world. Douglas has been a visiting professor or fellow at Duke, Harvard, the Hong Kong Institute for Monetary Research, IDC Herzliya, McGill, Melbourne, National University of Singapore, University of New South Wales, Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, and Zurich, among others. Professor Arner is the Senior Regulatory & Strategic Advisor of Aeneas Group, a multi-disciplinary financial services institution with technology-driven growth initiatives. He holds a BA from Drury College (where he studied literature, economics and political science) in 1992, a JD (cum laude) from Southern Methodist University in 1995, an LLM (with distinction) in banking and finance law from the University of London (Queen Mary College) in 1996, and a PhD from the University of London in 2005.