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Meet Our Team

A Place For Crafting And Bringing Ideas

Leadership Team

Dr. Shawki Salem, Ph.D

Founder

Dr. Shawki Salem, Ph.D. in Biostatistics, founded Symbiance in 1992, after spending seventeen years in the pharmaceutical industry as a Statistician, Senior Statistician, Director and Senior Director of Biostatistics

Ilango Ramanujam

President & Chief Executive Officer

Ilango, A Passionate Life Sciences Entrepreneur. Has over three decades of experience in Pharmaceutical, Bio-tech and CRO industry. Conceptualized and designed products to manage clinical data from collection to submission. Created and Built – Development and Services Teams – globally which delivered several regulatory critical systems in Clinical Data Sciences, with uncompromised quality to Pharmaceutical companies.

David Piester

Chief Commercial Officer

Dave heads the Sales, Marketing, Account Management, and Partners/Alliances. Dave is a seasoned senior software executive and skilled entrepreneur that specializes in taking new software tech products to market at start up/early stage software tech firms. He has been part of multiple exits/acquisitions at the pre-revenue stage with zero or one customer. Symbiance is his 6th tech focused organization he has worked at spanning almost 20 years. Dave Piester has been a player, coach, and mentor across most all sectors and verticals, specializing in simplifying highly complex ML/AI driven data enterprise solutions for large Fortune 100 companies to drive business outcomes.

Dave is always excited about taking to market new innovative products that Symbiance creates. He understands the start-up landscape well and enjoys mostly working in a flexible and collaborative environment that works together in forming a GTM strategy, that can pivot on a dime, in an ever-changing innovative tech landscape. Dave has an intuitive, proactive approach to creating innovative business development GTM strategies designed to stimulate sales, increase global market presence, and enhance bottom-line/top line results.

Jayapandian Nagamalaiyan

Senior Vice President, Biometrics.

Jayapandian heads the Data Management, Statistical Programming and Biostatistics here at Symbiance, driving innovation and growth in the Biometrics practice.

Jayapandian is a highly experienced professional with 19+ years of experience, 15 of which are in the Life Sciences/Healthcare/CRO and 4+ years in Credit Card Data Analytics. He has held various positions in healthcare organizations such as Novartis, GSK and Bayer. Prior to joining Symbiance, he was the Director (Regional Head) of Statistical Programming at Parexel.

Jayapandian is an active participant in external engagements within the healthcare industry, such as PHUSE, IASCT, ISCR, DIA and SCDM, delivering talks, being part of organizing committees, and chairing events. He has been a member and leader of PHUSE-India Single Day Events for a number of years and is also actively engaging with Industry-Academia collaborations such as SIBM (Symbiosis Institute of Business Management), Hyderabad. He is passionate about developing people through a strength-based approach, and is committed to providing his team with opportunities, motivation, career growth, and recognition.

Jayapandian holds a Master's degree in Computer Applications (MCA) and a Bachelor's degree in Mathematics and Statistics from Madurai Kamaraj University.

Susan Gallop, SPHR, SHRM-SCP, CEBS

Global Head, Human Resources

Susan Gallop, SPHR, SHRM-SCP, CEBS has served as a hands-on leader with a demonstrated competency of prioritizing and executing strategic change in complex environments. She brings a proven track record of workforce alignment with business goals to consistently achieve positive results. She has demonstrated capability in managing effective Human Resources operations, managing, guiding, and developing HR staff; coaching and developing supervisory management; and consulting with and developing leadership and staff.

She has served as a consulting manager for the service, manufacturing / distribution, and energy industries, both domestically and internationally, for over 20 years. She enjoys collaborating on organizational strategies designed to facilitate business growth.

She brings strong experience in managing employee relations, internal investigations and performance improvement programs, full-cycle recruitment, visa/immigration and compliance management, including ERISA, HIPAA, ACA/PPACA programs, FMLA, COBRA, ADA, FLSA and Wage and Hour.

She has a Master’s in HR / Organizational Development and 3 professional certifications in her field.

Mark Pittman

Head of Marketing & Inside Sales

Mark is one of the most focused and serving-minded sales and marketing professionals. Mark melds creativity, sweeping attentiveness and insight to pull off some incredible projects (& serve some big-time clients like Disney, Walden, Reebok). Described as top-shelf when it comes to face-to-face interaction (presentations, selling, training, coaching) - applying tenacious effort and focus to understand and be in "lock-step" with the purpose he's serving.

Mark’s Specialties are in sales, marketing strategy development, training development, all aspects of face-to-face communication, seminar training, tradeshow presentation, tradeshow set-up and marketing, out-of-the-box marketing ideas, event planning, corp. development, branding and identity, PR, team development and strategic growth.

Mark's industry experience cuts across numerous verticals including Big Data Analytics, Data Governance Innovation, Music Industry, and various non-profits. With a past that includes college athletics, he's a little competitive.. but keeps one eye on the score and one on his teammates.

Senthilkumar Karuppiah

Executive Vice President – Business Services

Senthil Kumar is a senior-level executive with extensive experience in Biometrics. He holds the full P&L responsibility of our Biometrics team. He oversees strategic growth and operational delivery of MSP/FSP services for Symbiance and leads our global team across multiple disciplines, to ensure quality and streamline operations. Senthil has held various leadership positions with increasing responsibility in biometrics, and he manages CRO services (Data Management, Data Standards, Biostatistics, Statistical programming and medical writing, all operations) and projects globally.

Alphons Philips PhD, MBA

Vice President, Pharmacovigilance and Regulatory Operations

Alphons is an accomplished life Sciences Expert with over 20 years of experience in building drug safety practices and life sciences technology services globally. His experiences includes successful establishment of Pharmacovigilance systems in Europe, US and in India. He worked with global major pharma/biotech companies like Wyeth, Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson and, other global CROs. The industries he worked include Biopharmaceuticals, Radiopharmaceuticals, Cosmeceuticals, Medical devices and consumer products. Being a industry expert in the area of Aggregate reports, signal detection and global risk management plans, he worked with global companies building life sciences technologies for safety, clinical and regulatory.

Dr. Chao Chen

Senior Director, Biostatistics

Chao has hands-on experience in statistical methodology as well as in-depth understanding of the underlying theory. His therapeutic experience covers a wide spectrum with significant contribution in neurology, oncology, cardiology and ophthalmology. Serving as an unblinded biostatistician and working closely with clinicians to review interim data under data monitoring committee set-up is another area Chao has dedicated to. In addition to coordinating all the biostatistical activities in clinical trials, he also published research articles in biostatistical and clinical journals.

Caryl Parker

Director, Administrative Services

Caryl joined Symbiance in 2002 as an Office Administrator and quickly moved up the ranks culminating in her current role as Director, Administrative Services.

With a keen eye for detail and a commitment to efficiency, Caryl has implemented processes that have streamlined operations, reduced costs, and improved overall productivity. Caryl is also committed to creating a supportive work environment that values equality and professional development.

Caryl holds a BA in Business Economics. She has a deep sense of commitment to advancing diversity and inclusion and is a diligent professional always willing to take the initiative when the company needs it most.