Simona Varani

Partner, Managing Director​

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Dr. Varani’s expertise is in the scientific innovation capture and patent protection, prioritization of the patent portfolio, patent prosecution and defense, clearance of external scientific communication, intellectual property due diligence and trade mark protection strategies.   She typically works for Zebra's clients as an in-house agent helping them to create and implement strategies to manage their IP estate.  Dr. Varani also acts as a local agent for a UK based law firm, providing Zebra clients with seamless flow of services from innovation capture to patent filing.

Prior to the creation of Zebra Ventures, Simona worked as Head of IP for Bioxell, a Roche spin off company in Milan, Italy.  Simona Varani received a B.Sc. degree in molecular biology and has worked for over 10 years in the academic and biotech institutions in Italy and US.  She has authored several papers published in major peer reviewed journals.

Marija Zecevic, PhD

Partner, Managing Director​​

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Dr. Zecevic has over 10 years of experience in business development, licensing, alliance management, and corporate strategy.  She has led licensing discussions with top 10 pharma companies and has worked on several contract manufacturing and fund raising deals for both publicly traded and privately held small and mid size biotech organizations in the US and Europe.

She earned the Ph.D. degree at the University of Zurich in the field of human physiology.  Prior to Zebra, she worked at Bioxell, Roche spin off in Italy where she supported all licensing and fundraising activities from blue chip European and US VC funds as well as the IPO process for listing on Swiss Stock Exchange (SWX: BXLN) She has worked in both academic research and private biotechs where she was responsible for drug discovery and target validation studies.  She also has completed a business degree in healthcare management at the University of Bocconi in Italy.