Meet the team
Beyond the science at DIVERSA
Our story
DIVERSA is a biotechnology spin-off from the Santiago de Compostela Health Research Institute and the Galician Health Service
Working with pharma and biotech companies, we identified a common need for delivery solutions in drug development. Overcoming biological barriers is a crucial step to produce efficient pharmaceutical products. Our formulations make this happen.
Our team
Experts in drug delivery, from research to business
María de la Fuente
María de la Fuente, co-founder and CEO/CSO of DIVERSA, has a Ph.D. in pharmaceutical technology, nanotechnology, and drug administration from the University of Santiago de Compostela. In addition, she has training in management, direction, and entrepreneurship, highlighting his participation in the Senior Management Program of Research, Innovation and Technology Transfer Institutions of the University of Navarra (IESE), the program in Business Leadership Development and Team Management from ESADE (Ramon Llull University), and the Caixaimpulse program, taught by the Barcelona School of Management, for knowledge transfer and entrepreneurship. She has completed an Executive MBA (Galicia Business School). She has also participated in Bootcamps such as Oncostars and PANACEA in Oxford and received additional training in programs from the Xunta de Galicia (GAIN -Oxentia- and ACIS), as well as other Europeans (EIT Health). Her previous activity in technology transfer is related to the license to Advancell SL of several patents, being co-inventor of them, and to the participation in knowledge transfer during her stay in the SOP-UCL. Concerning her professional experience, María is the head of the Nano-Oncology and Translational Therapeutics group at the Health Research Institute of Santiago de Compostela (IDIS), Clinical University Hospital, and has experience in leadership, teamwork, and resource management. From her professional independence as Principal Investigator, she has raised more than 4.5M€ of public and private funds in competitive calls, of which 0.6M€ have been specific for technology transfer.
Abi Vázquez
Abi Vázquez, co-founder and COO of DIVERSA, has a degree in biology, a master’s degree in Biomedical Research, and a Ph.D. in Molecular Medicine from the University of Santiago de Compostela. Her doctoral thesis focused on providing solutions to face one of the biggest current challenges in oncology, the metastases, and moving towards the concept of personalized medicine. She also has training in technology transfer through her participation in various courses and workshops at renowned business schools such as the CaixaImpulse Validate Program (Barcelona School of Management). Abi has been fully involved from the conception of the project to the establishment of the company. She has participated in the development of the technology, the standardization of procedures, elaboration and validation of the business model, and selection and interaction with strategic partners.
Rafael López
Rafael López, medical advisor and the third co-founder of DIVERSA, is head of the Medical Oncology Service of the Hospital Clínico Universitario de Santiago de Compostela (CHUS) and professor at the University of Santiago de Compostela (USC), as well as head of the research group of the IDIS of Translational Medical Oncology (ONCOMET). He participates in international and national projects as principal investigator and belongs to different groups and consortia. He is responsible for the CHUS Clinical Trials Unit, with more than 100 projects currently underway. Furthermore, he has been involved in more than 25 competitive projects in the last five years, and as a result, he is a co-inventor of 6 patents. He is a co-founder of the spin-off NasasBiotech SL.
Víctor Francis
Víctor Francis, DIVERSA’s business developer, is a solution- oriented sales professional with more than 15 years of experience in life sciences, more than ten years of practical experience in research, and more than five years in marketing and business development in Germany and the United States, managing sales for more than $5M, and achieving continued growth. He will be in charge of studying the market, customers, suppliers, defining the best marketing and commercial strategies, and establishing long-term relationships to expand the business. It will also attend trade shows, such as conferences, fairs, and forums that allow him to keep up to date with the technologies and solutions offered by the competition and must be permanently updated to be able to optimize the quality of the products and the competitiveness of the costs. He will be in charge of establishing explorative and collaborative agreements with third parties and establishing the appropriate framework to define projects for the development of diagnostic and therapeutic technologies.
Gabriela Garrastazu
Gabriela is a pharmacist and PhD in pharmaceutical sciences in Brazil, and developed her career as a researcher between Brazil, Italy and Australia. She worked for three years as an assistant professor at the University of Região da Campanha (2015-2019), teaching Pharmaceutical Technology and Galénic Pharmacy and another three years as a guest professor in a Master’s degree, teaching Pharmaceutical and Cosmetic Technology at the Lusofona University of Lisbon (2019-2021). Her skills include the development / characterization of nanoparticles for different routes of administration, in vitro testing of new pharmaceutical forms, analytical method development, scale-up, as well as researcher supervision, teaching, and mentoring. She also has previous experience in entrepreneurship. At DIVERSA, she manages DIVERSA’s R&D team, coordinates the tasks of the research team, and the projects.
Laura Taina
Laura Taina, lab researcher of DIVERSA. Laura studied Pharmacy at Universidad Complutense from Madrid, where she graduated in 2017. In the same year, she started a Master of Science in Biopharmaceuticals at King’s College London, where she performed her Master thesis in medicinal chemistry aiming to find new antibiotics for Tuberculosis. After graduation, Laura joined Prof. Thurston’s lab, in a drug discovery project aiming to find new candidate molecules for Tinnitus. A few months later, she joined AstraZeneca, Cambridge, UK; where she was part of the Advanced Drug Delivery team. In this company, she worked as a pharmaceutical scientist, being part of the formulation development process for small molecules and PROTACs. In November 2020 she started her PhD at Health Research Institute of Santiago de Compostela, where she is currently based. Her thesis aims to find new delivery approaches for nucleic acids.
