Chris Benko first joined Merck when he was but a lad of eighteen, rising through the ranks in HR and talent management to become one of the youngest VPs in the history of the organization, at the age of 34.

But instead of continuing his ascending career into the senior ranks of biopharma, Chris opted instead to scratch the entrepreneurial itch and, after several years in Merck venture capital group, he founded a new company and left Merck to run it.

Benko’s startup, Koneksa Health, focuses on applying the tools of digital health to the challenges of early clinical drug development. The goal is to support better internal decisions, particularly about which might be the most promising drug candidates, through the application of real world patient data obtained in the setting of a pharmaceutical clinical study. The company is one of several that is leveraging the ever-expanding world of data to improve operations, efficacy and efficiency within the healthcare landscape.

We are delighted to welcome Chris to Tech Tonics. Join us as we discuss his path from the Fortune 100 to fortune-seeker at an enterprise of his own making.

This episode of Tech Tonics is sponsored by DNAnexus, the secure and compliant cloud platform that enables enterprise users to analyze, collaborate around, and integrate massive amounts of genetic and other health data.

Tags: biomed, Chris Benko, david shaywitz, digital health, dnanexus, epatient, genomics, health startup, health technology, human genome, Koneksa Health, lisa suennen, medical research, Merck, precision medicine, tech tonics, technology and health, venture valkyrie
 
Posted in: Audio Podcast, Healthcare, Tech Tonics