James Coon is the Chief Executive Officer of Emulate and has been in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry for over 20 years. Coon has most recently served as Entrepreneur in Residence at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University, providing researchers with insights on commercialization and product development, target markets, and fundraising strategies in both Nanotherapeutic and Organs-on-Chips technologies.

Coon has served as a co-founder, executive management, and strategic partner for numerous healthcare and biotech startup companies, including roles as President of RxGen, President and CEO of BCS, Inc., President and CEO of HepatoTech, Inc., Executive Vice-President of CellzDirect (acquired by Invitrogen-Life Technologies), and the Senior Director of Business Development for RTI International.

Earlier in his career, Coon held a range of management positions at Fisons Pharmaceutical, Astra Arcus, AstraZeneca, and GlaxoSmithKline. He received his undergraduate degree in Biochemistry from the Rochester Institute of Technology, and completed his graduate work in liver cell biology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine.