Mr Palay is a member of the Council on Strategic Risks Board of Directors. Mr. Palay is Chairman of Tactics II Equity LLC, a life science investment and advisory firm. From 2016-2017 Mr. Palay was a Fellow at Harvard’s Advanced Leadership Initiative where he focused on emerging biothreats. From 2004 through 2015 Mr. Palay was a founder, Chairman of the Board, and Chief Executive Officer of Cellular Dynamic International (NASDAQ: ICEL), a leader in pluripotent stem cell technology for drug discovery and cell therapy (acquired by FujiFilm in 2015). From 1999 to 2007 Mr. Palay was a co-founder and Chairman of the Board of NimbleGen Systems, Inc., a genomics tools company (acquired by Roche in 2007). From 2003 through 2006 Mr. Palay also was a co-founder and Chairman of the Board of Genetic Assemblies, a synthetic biology company (acquired by Codon Devices in 2006). In addition, Mr. Palay has served as a manager of multiple Tactics II companies, entities specializing in life science investments. Prior to Tactics II, Mr. Palay was a Vice President at Sam Zell’s Equity Group Investments.
Mr. Palay holds an AB, magna cum laude, from Harvard College, a MBA from J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management, and JD from Northwestern University School of Law.