Wa'el Al Rawashdeh

Senior Director, Development

Dr. Al Rawashdeh has an interdisciplinary career focusing on the clinical translation of cell therapies and development of molecular imaging platforms. Prior to joining Ossium, he held a number of critical roles at Miltenyi Biotec, a global market-leader in cell processing, that enabled the creation of a successful CAR T cell therapy program. Dr. Al Rawashdeh developed industry-leading non-clinical development (NCD) and molecular imaging platforms and led the in vivo NCD packages of the CAR T cell therapy program, which in 4 years resulted in 4 CIT approvals in Germany, 1 IND pivotal trial FDA application, and 1 successful approval of an ‘orphan drug’ by the EMA. Dr. Al Rawashdeh developed a novel animal model that permitted the approval of the first CAR T cell clinical trial in Europe targeting melanoma.

On the research front, Dr. Al Rawashdeh spearheaded the initiation of an industry-academia consortium that successfully secured a major grant of $1.6 million from the EU European Funding for Regional Development initiative to develop novel CAR T cell therapies against solid tumors and cell tracking strategies, and led the project up to the time of his departure in 2021, when he joined Ossium. .

As a postdoc at RWTH Aachen University, Germany’s top engineering university, Dr. Al Rawashdeh co-developed novel optical imaging technology that convinced MiLabs, a global leader in molecular imaging, to adopt the technology and build and commercialize a hybrid tomography system that generated over $10 million in sales to date. Furthermore, on the basis of his original research and project design where he recruited industry partners from Germany, Italy and the UK, he secured a $1 million grant from the European Union’s European Commission in the highly competitive multi-country BioPhotonics call.

Dr. Al Rawashdeh completed his BS from California State University, Fresno, and his MSc and Ph.D. from RWTH Aachen University.