John Higgins

John Higgins is Managing Director at the Brain Tumor Investment Fund. John’s career spans 30 years in biopharma commercialization and business development, progressing in roles of increasing responsibility within both large and emerging companies. Prior to BTIF, John served as VP Commercial and Corporate Development at Istari Oncology, a clinical-stage company formed to develop and commercialize an investigational immune activator for glioblastoma and other solid tumors. John was integral in Istari’s Series B raise of over $40M, as well as starting the business development function and creating a significant number of business relationships for the company. Prior to that, John served as President and General Manager of ProStrakan Inc., (now Kyowa Kirin) leading the transformation of that oncology business into a profit-contributor. John’s range of experience also includes AstraZeneca, Baxter Healthcare, NicOx Inc. and Cytogen. John’s role in BTIF is to raise philanthropic capital and leverage the National Brain Tumor Society’s (NBTS) expertise to identify and purposefully invest in emerging biotechnology, pharmaceutical, and medical device companies developing new treatments and diagnostics for brain tumors. John leads the end-to-end process, including identification, outreach, due diligence and investment with the goal to fuel the development of new and promising brain tumor treatments that might otherwise be stalled by funding gaps. John received his B.A. from Villanova University.