As a partner with the Capricorn Health-Tech Venture Fund since 2012, Ekaterina (Katya) Smirnyagina has seen many teams get formed, grow, succeed (and fail). 

Prior to this she was for a decade with Alta Partners, a US healthcare focused venture firm. Her current and past board memberships include Adocia (Euronext: ADOC.PA), ConfoTherapeutics NV, HalioDx SA, iSTAR Medical SA, Nexstim plc , Ablynx, Cerenis Therapeutics, Innate Pharma  and Kiadis Pharma.  

Katya is also on the board of InvestEurope (fkaEVCA) and is the current Vice-Chair of its VC Council.  Previously she has worked in business development at Genset S.A. and management consulting. Katya was a postdoctoral fellow in microbiology & immunology at the Stanford University School of Medicine and holds a Ph.D. in cellular & molecular biology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a B.Sc. in biochemistry from Moscow State University