Omar Perez's Biography

Omar Perez, Associate Director, Pfizer Inc

Dr. Perez has over 15 years experience in diagnostic and drug development. He currently oversees companion diagnostic development activities for the oncology portfolio at Pfizer. He previously served as the Director for R&D Diagnostics at Tocagen where he led the preclinical and diagnostic assay development efforts for Toca 511, a gene therapy product for glioblastoma. Prior to Tocagen, Dr. Perez was the Senior Director of Research and Technology at Nodality Inc., a diagnostic company he co-founded. Prior to Nodality, Dr. Perez was the Senior Scientist and Director of the phospho-protein flow cytometry group at the Stanford Proteomics Center in the Stanford Medical Center, overseeing project management for antibody screening procedures, autoimmune clinical studies, and small compound profiling for many major pharmaceutical companies. During his time at Stanford, in Dr. Garry Nolan’s laboratory, he developed several proteomic related systems for functionally characterizing signaling networks in single cells. He is an inventor of the multiparametric phospho-proteomic flow technologies and an author of 35 publications and 34 patents. During that time, Dr. Perez was also a consultant for Becton Dickinson Biosciences, where he worked with senior management and scientific teams to develop the PhosFlow product line. During his time at UC Berkeley, Dr. Perez worked with Dr. Peter Schultz in combinatorial chemistry screening projects. Dr. Perez is recipient of several prestigious awards including the Herzenberg Prize, the Human Immunology Award Dana Foundation, the Bristol Myers Squibb-Irvington Award and a Kauffman Fellow.

Dr. Perez received his doctorate in Molecular Pharmacology from Stanford University. He holds a B.A in both Molecular Biology and Philosophy with distinction and Chemistry degrees from the University of California, Berkeley. He received an executive education certificate in management and leadership at the MIT Sloan School of Management.