Robert Nelsen
Board Member
Co-founder and managing director, ARCH Venture Partners
Robert Nelsen is a co-founder and a managing director of ARCH Venture Partners. He joined ARCH at its founding and played a significant role in the creation, early sourcing, financing and development of more than 150 companies, including 39 that have reached valuations exceeding $1 billion.
Robert is focused on generating new ideas for disruptive technologies or business models and partnering with founding management teams and entrepreneurs to execute on these visions by advancing novel platform technologies with the overarching goal of improving health care and outcomes.
Some of his notable early-stage investments include Illumina (ILMN), Alnylam Pharmaceuticals (ALNY), June Therapeutics (JUNO – acquired by Celgene), Beam Therapeutics (BEAM), Karuna Therapeutics (KRTX), Altos Labs, EQRx (EQRX), National Resilience, Prime Medicine, Lyell Immunopharma (LYEL), Array BioPharma (ARRY – acquired by Pfizer), Hua Medicine (2552:HK), Vir Biotechnology (VIR), insitro, Agios Pharmaceuticals (AGIO), Sage Therapeutics (SAGE), GRAIL (acquired by Illumina), Gossamer Bio (GOSS), Ikaria (acquired by Mallinckrodt), Kythera Biopharmaceuticals (KYTH – acquired by Allergan), Receptos (RCPT – acquired by Celgene), Aviron (AVIR – acquired by MedImmune), Denali Therapeutics (DNLI), Syros Pharmaceuticals (SYRS), Sana Biotechnology (SANA), Verve Therapeutics (VERV), Brii Biosciences (2137:HK), Bluebird Bio (BLUE), R2 Technology (acquired by Hologic), Caliper Life Sciences (CALP – acquired by PerkinElmer), Trubion Pharmaceuticals (TRBN – acquired by Emergent Biosolutions), Adolor (ADLR – acquired by Cubist Pharmaceuticals), deCODE Genetics (DCGN – acquired by Amgen), Editas (EDIT), 10x Genomics, Semma Therapeutics (acquired by Vertex Pharmaceuticals), Element and IDUN Pharmaceuticals (acquired by Pfizer).
Robert is a director of VIR, SANA, LYEL, National Resilience, insitro, Prime Medicine, Nutcracker Therapeutics, Neumora Therapeutics and Brii Biosciences, and serves as chairman of Hua Medicine, among others. He previously served as a trustee of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Institute, the Institute of Systems Biology and was a director of the National Venture Capital association.
Robert holds an MBA from the University of Chicago and a B.S. from the University of Puget Sound with majors in economics and biology.