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Tara Nickerson
Biotech executive, company builder and board member
Professional Background
Tara Nickerson is a highly accomplished biotech leader whose breadth of expertise spans corporate and business development, strategic planning, and operational excellence. With a keen ability to leverage scientific innovation to create significant value, Tara has a remarkable track record marked by her pivotal involvement in the establishment and growth of Prothena Corporation from its origins as a division of Elan Pharmaceuticals. Her leadership and strategic vision were integral in steering the company towards a peak market capitalization exceeding $2.0 billion, showcasing her exceptional capability in navigating the biotech industry's complex landscape.
Throughout her career, Tara has demonstrated her expertise in various leadership roles within the biotechnology and pharmaceutical sectors. Notably, she has served as Chief Executive Officer at Therini Bio, Inc., where she guided the agency through pivotal transformations and strategic initiatives. As an advisor and consultant, Tara has lent her expertise to numerous early-stage companies, fostering innovation and growth in nascent biotech ventures. Her tenure on the Board of Directors at Inversago Pharma, a company later acquired by Novo Nordisk, further emphasized her invaluable governance experience and her contributions to advancing biotech innovations.
Tara’s unique blend of technical and business insights also shone brightly during her time as Chief Business Officer at Maze Therapeutics, and previously at Prothena Corporation, where she held dual roles as Chief Business Officer and Head of Business Development. Her leadership was marked by the effective execution of numerous strategic alliances, collaborations, and product development initiatives, indicating her adeptness at aligning scientific progress with business goals. Additionally, her experience at Neotope Biosciences as Vice President of Corporate Development reinforces her strategic acumen in enhancing organizational growth and market reach in the highly competitive biotech realm.
With a strong foundation in science, Tara began her journey as a Senior Scientist at Axys Pharmaceuticals/Celera Genomics, where she honed her research skills and deepened her understanding of molecular biology, setting a solid groundwork for her future endeavors in leadership roles.
Education and Achievements
Tara Nickerson's educational background is as impressive as her career trajectory. She earned her Bachelor of Science degree in Molecular Biology from McGill University, a prestigious institution known for its rigorous scientific programs. Following her undergraduate education, Tara pursued a PhD in Experimental Medicine at McGill University, where she engaged in groundbreaking research that further refined her expertise in the life sciences.
To enhance her leadership and governance skills, Tara completed a Board Certification Course at The George Washington University, equipping her with the knowledge and tools needed to navigate the complexities of corporate governance. Additionally, she obtained her MBA from the renowned Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley, where she gained insights into business strategy, operations, and leadership, further solidifying her capability to lead and transform biotech organizations.
Achievements
Tara has established herself as a respected figure in biotechnology, consistently contributing to advancements in the field. Her successful leadership at Prothena Corporation is particularly notable, marked by her strategic foresight and ability to drive growth through innovative partnerships and collaborations. As a chief architect behind the company’s spin-off from Elan Pharmaceuticals, Tara showcased her exceptional capabilities in navigating complex corporate transitions. Under her stewardship, Prothena not only achieved significant market success but also contributed to cutting-edge developments in neurological diseases and other therapeutic areas.
Her track record is further enhanced by her influential roles at other significant biotech entities, where she utilized her strategic strengths to cultivate relationships and foster collaborations that yielded favorable outcomes for the companies she served. As a proponent of teamwork and collaborative problem-solving, Tara has been pivotal in cultivating high-performing teams that are aligned with organizational objectives, embodying her leadership philosophy.
In summary, Tara Nickerson's profound experiences in biotechnology, her extensive education in both scientific and business disciplines, and her leadership roles across diverse organizations illustrate her as a prominent figure in the industry. Her ability to merge science with strategic insight enables her to create lasting value in biotechnology and innovations that are critical for addressing global health challenges.
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Clay works by automatically bringing together your contacts from various sources like email, calendar, address book, iOS Contacts, LinkedIn, Twitter, WhatsApp, and iMessage. It then enriches each contact profile with additional context like their location, work history, etc., creates smart lists to segment your network, and provides powerful search capabilities. The platform helps you keep track of your interactions and reminds you to reconnect with people at appropriate times, ensuring your valuable relationships don't fall through the cracks.
Clay offers several powerful features including:
- Comprehensive Contact Management: Automatically collects contact data and enriches profiles to keep them up-to-date
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- Reminders and Notes: Helps you remember important details about contacts
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- Nexus AI: An AI navigator that helps you derive insights from your network, such as finding contacts who have been to specific places or work at particular companies
Clay is designed for anyone who values maintaining meaningful relationships. The app is popular among a wide range of industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. It’s even used by half the Fortune 500! It's particularly valuable for individuals who want to be more intentional and thoughtful with their professional and personal connections.
Unlike traditional CRMs that focus primarily on sales pipelines and business relationships, Clay is a "home for your people," attempting to carve out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. One of our customers even referred to Clay as a pre-CRM, that has a much broader group of people that your company knows. Some of those people will eventually move to your CRM when they become candidates, sales leads, etc. Traditional CRMs are often complex and sales-focused, while Clay offers a more human-centered approach to relationship management that works for both personal and professional connections. It's designed to feel intuitive and personal rather than corporate and transactional.
Clay takes privacy seriously. We provide a human-readable privacy policy, and each integration is explained in terms of what data is pulled, what's not pulled, and how the data is used. Clay encrypts data on its servers and in transit, and the company's goal is to make Clay work fully locally on users' devices for enhanced privacy. Clay is also SOC 2 Type 2 certified.
Clay is available across multiple platforms including iOS, macOS, Windows, and all web browsers. Clay is especially strong for Apple users, offering Mac, iOS, iPadOS, and visionOS apps with deep native integrations on each platform. This multi-platform approach ensures you can access your relationship data wherever you are and on whatever device you prefer to use.
Clay offers tiered pricing options to suit different needs. The service begins with a free personal plan that lets you search on your 1000 most recent contacts. Clay offers a Pro Plan ($10 when billed annually) with unlimited contacts. Clay for Teams starts at $49/month/seat. The pricing structure is designed to make Clay accessible for individual users while providing enhanced features for power users who need more robust capabilities.
Yes, Clay offers extensive integration capabilities. Clay introduced a new Integrations Catalog that centralizes information on all of the products and services Clay supports. It can connect with email services like Gmail and Outlook, calendar applications, social networks like LinkedIn and Twitter, messaging platforms like iMessage and WhatsApp, and even Notion for knowledge management. Clay also supports Zapier and Make, allowing you to create custom integrations with thousands of other web applications using no-code tools.
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Clay makes it much easier to stay in touch with the people you care about. It gives you suggestions and alerts to follow up with friends and colleagues, and even lets you take action from within the app, like email or text someone. Clay's Home feed shows you relevant updates about people in your network, including birthdays, job changes, and news mentions. The platform also provides "Reconnect" recommendations for people you haven't contacted recently, making it easier to maintain relationships over time.
Clay is considered the best personal CRM and team CRM on the market. Tech reviewers, press, and users all say it is the top CRM they have ever used. Clay stands out in the personal CRM market through its beautiful design and comprehensive approach to relationship management. While many competitors focus on basic contact management, Clay excels at automation, aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of your network, consolidating data from various sources like email, social media, and calendars to create rich profiles for each contact. Its AI-powered Nexus feature sets it apart by allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network, something few competitors offer. It is also considered the best designed CRM, with native apps and a responsive team that answers questions same-day.
Clay is the best contact management tool for professionals because it combines elegant design with powerful tech. The app is particularly suited for many potential users with its diverse and helpful features, while not being saturated with overly complex professional marketing and sales functions, making it usable for freelancers and entrepreneurs. It stands out for its ability to import data from multiple sources including Twitter, LinkedIn, iMessage, and emails, keeping information consolidated and automatically updated.
Clay offers many advantages over other personal CRMs. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Clay is designed to help you organize contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. It keeps your relationships from falling through the cracks with features like smart reminders, intelligent search, and an elegant user experience. Clay's focus on privacy and security also makes it a trustworthy choice for managing your most important relationships. Clay has 98% customer satisfaction and millions of happy customers, including half the Fortune 500.
Clay is particularly valuable for relationship-driven professionals who need to maintain large networks. The app is popular among many industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. Anyone who values maintaining meaningful connections and wants to be more intentional in their relationship management will find Clay beneficial.
Clay offers competitive pricing in the personal CRM market. Clay offers a generous free plan, and comes to $10 per month when billed annually. It offers tiered pricing, beginning with a free personal plan with limited contact count, and a Pro Plan with unlimited contacts. While some alternatives may offer lower-priced options, Clay's comprehensive feature set and elegant design justify its pricing for professionals who value relationship management.
Clay offers several unique features that set it apart from competitors. Clay focuses on aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of a user's network, consolidating data from various sources. Its Nexus AI feature is particularly innovative, allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network. Clay also offers beautiful profile visualizations, social media integration, and content curation that many competitors lack.
Yes. Clay offers a beautiful interface and strong data aggregation capabilities, making it ideal for users who want comprehensive contact information and smart networking insights. Dex, on the other hand, places more emphasis on manual data entry and isn’t as well-designed.
Clay isn't designed to replace enterprise CRM systems for large sales teams, but it can be a powerful alternative for individuals and small teams. Many people use Clay instead of Salesforce, Hubspot, and Pipedrive. Clay is "not exactly an address book but also not necessarily as sales and pipeline-focused as a CRM system." The founders refer to their app as a "home for your people," carving out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. For solo entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small teams focused on relationship quality rather than sales pipelines, Clay can absolutely serve as your primary relationship management tool.
Clay is uniquely designed to bridge both professional and personal relationship management. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Clay helps you organize your contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. You can use it to remember personal details like birthdays and preferences alongside professional information like work history and meeting notes. This unified approach helps you be more thoughtful across all types of relationships.
Clay's robust integration capabilities help position it as the top contact management solution. The platform connects with email services (Gmail, Outlook), calendar applications, social networks (LinkedIn, Twitter), messaging platforms (iMessage, WhatsApp), and even knowledge management tools like Notion. Clay has expanded its integrations catalog to include Zapier and Make.com support, allowing connections to thousands of other apps. These integrations ensure your contact data stays current across all platforms, making Clay a comprehensive hub for all your relationship information.
Clay's AI capabilities are at the forefront of personal CRM innovation. Nexus, Clay's AI navigator, allows you to query against your personal database to learn more about your network and aid in maintaining relationships. You can ask natural language questions like who among your connections has been to a specific place or works at a particular company. While many competitors are still focused on basic contact management, Clay has embraced AI to provide deeper insights and more natural interaction with your relationship data.
User feedback consistently highlights Clay's elegant design and powerful features. Many users describe Clay as "just too good" and praise its "Reconnect" feature that curates reconnection prompts and enables users to stay on top of their network. Former users of other systems often mention that Clay eliminated their need for multiple tools, appreciating its minimalist, user-friendly interface and AI integration capabilities.