Veteran bioscience entrepreneur Max Wallace will receive the Council for Entrepreneurial Development’s Life Science Leadership Award, to be presented in February at the 27th annual CED Life Science Conference in Raleigh.

“I am proud to be part of North Carolina’s vibrant community of innovators who are solving problems that affect lives around the world,” Wallace said in a prepared statement. “I am especially honored to be selected for the Life Science Leadership Award at this year’s CED Life Science Conference. While we work to find tomorrow’s technology, it is important to come together to celebrate our progress. I look forward to doing just that at the conference.”

Wallace is chief executive officer of Accelerate Brain Cancer Cure (ABC²), a nonprofit venture philanthropy organization that has helped bring 30 new brain cancer treatments into the clinic. He previously was CEO of TheraLogics, an anti-cancer company based on technology from the University of North Carolina. He also co-founded and served as President of Trimeris, a public company that developed Fuzeon, the first FDA-approved viral entry inhibitor, establishing a whole new class of drugs for HIV/AIDS and other viral diseases.

Wallace founded and developed several other biopharmaceutical companies in North Carolina, including Sphinx Pharmaceuticals (now part of Eli Lilly & Co), the first venture-funded biotech company in the state; Cogent Neuroscience; and SARCO (now part of PPD). He helped build and serves on the board of Humacyte, a tissue engineering company named one of the country’s ten most innovative biotech companies by Fast Company magazine.

Wallace previously held positions at Duke University, including as a founding director of Duke Management Company, the university’s asset-management arm. He was a member of the board of directors of the Emerging Companies Section of the Biotechnology Industry Association (BIO). He served as chair of the National Cancer Institute’s Council of Research Advocates, as chair of CED, and as chairman of the North Carolina Biosciences Organization (NCBIO). He co-founded Duke’s Program in Non-Profit Management and taught non-profit management at Duke’s Sanford School of Public Policy.

Presented annually at the CED Life Science Conference, the CED Life Science Leadership Award recognizes an individual who has made a significant impact on the life science community in North Carolina. Past recipients of the award have included:

  • Art Pappas managing partner of Pappas Capital
  • Fred Eshelman, founder of Eshelman Ventures and PPD
  • Bob Ingram, general partner at Hatteras Venture Partners and former CEO of GlaxoSmithKline
  • Dennis Gillings, founder of Quintiles and co-founder of GHO Capital
  • Ralph Snyderman, James B. Duke Professor of Medicine and Chancellor Emeritus of Duke University.

Wallace will receive his award on Feb. 28 at the closing lunch of the CED Life Science Conference at the Raleigh Convention Center. The two-day conference is the main life science event in the Southeast. It will attract about 1,000 attendees including entrepreneurs, investors, corporate leaders and industry visionaries from across the nation.

The conference is presented in partnership with the North Carolina Biotechnology Center and NCBIO.

The CED is a Durham-based nonprofit organization that promotes entrepreneurial business growth.