Alzheimer’s Drug Discovery Foundation Doubles Down on Mission to Conquer Alzheimer’s, Convening New Coalition of Experts to Join Board

UPDATE: Since the publication of this press release, Kristin Rae Cecchi, Marketing Design Consultant at Cecchi Homes; Phyllis Ferrell, Chief Impact Officer of the Alzheimer's Moonshot at StartUp Health; and Laura Steele, Senior Vice President, U.S. Neuroscience Business Unit at Eli Lilly and Company, have also been added to the board.

The Alzheimer's Drug Discovery Foundation (ADDF) has announced seven new members to its Board of Governors, spanning from industry experts to leading philanthropy executives, to further accelerate its mission to conquer Alzheimer’s. The new members include Niranjan Bose, PhD, Managing Director of Health & Life Sciences at Gates Ventures; Ric Edelman, Founder of The Truth About Your Future and the Digital Assets Council of Financial Professionals; Adam Hoffman, President of The Foundation For A Better World; Rachid Izzar, Executive Vice President of Global Product Strategy & Commercialization at Biogen; Ann Jackson, Philanthropist; Philip Scheltens, MD, PhD, Partner & Head of the Dementia Fund at EQT Group; and Julieann Shanahan, CFA, Creator of Pavilion Living and Family Council Member at the Shanahan Family Foundation.

“Following the historic gift the ADDF received from the Lauder family last year, we have committed to expanding our board with key leaders from various sectors whose skillsets and vision are precisely suited to advance our work,” said Mark Roithmayr, ADDF Chief Executive Officer. “The diverse expertise of these new board members will further strengthen our efforts to shape and lead the science toward the ultimate goal of combination therapies and precision medicine for Alzheimer’s.”

The new additions to the board reflect the ADDF’s global presence and will help guide the organization as it builds on its legacy of innovation. To date, the ADDF has invested more than $290 million to fund over 750 Alzheimer's drug development, biomarker, and prevention programs in 20 countries. As part of these efforts, the ADDF champions a biology of aging approach based on the many biological factors that contribute to Alzheimer's, providing the foundation for the next generation of therapies. Today, nearly 75% of the drug pipeline is aimed at novel targets informed by this approach.

“We have seen incredible progress in Alzheimer’s research over the past few years, with new drugs being approved, better diagnostic tests becoming available, and proven prevention methods emerging,” said Leonard A. Lauder, ADDF Co-Chairman and Co-Founder. “The ADDF’s fingerprints can be seen on nearly all these critical developments. The leadership of our board has been vital to our efforts to bring about the next generation of Alzheimer’s treatments, and it is incredibly gratifying to see this work advance.”

“Thanks to the dedication of our board and the world-class scientists we support, the ADDF has also become a leader in precision prevention,” said Ronald S. Lauder, ADDF Co-Chairman and Co-Founder. “Last year, we established a first-of-its-kind partnership with the world’s leading expert in Alzheimer’s prevention, Dr. Miia Kivipelto, who also serves on our board.”

Advances in biomarkers are vital to enabling this type of precision medicine approach. The field needs new biomarkers to complement the novel drugs being developed, an area in which the ADDF has seen success, funding the first PET scan and blood test for Alzheimer’s disease. Through its Diagnostics Accelerator (DxA), the ADDF has also seeded a pipeline of new blood tests, including a promising antibody from ALZpath, as well as eye scans and digital tools.

As the ADDF’s diverse portfolio of novel drugs and biomarkers advances, it brings the field closer to the gold standard of combination therapies and precision medicine for treating Alzheimer’s, an approach used successfully in cancer treatment. With multiple amyloid-targeting drugs now available for patients, it is more critical than ever to accelerate the development of diverse therapies that can be used in tandem with these treatments to strengthen their effects, as well as biomarkers that will help us track the effects of these drugs and target treatments for individual patients.