Matt joined Kisbee as Chief Scientific Officer after serving as Senior Vice President and Division Head for Gene Therapy Research and Technical Operations at Astellas Gene Therapies. In this role, he managed a global team of approximately 350 individuals spread across North Carolina, California and Japan, responsible for leading the Astellas' pre-clinical gene therapy portfolio and all gene therapy manufacturing activities from project initiation through commercialization.
Mathew received a PhD in human genetics from the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and conducted a post-doctoral fellowship at the Genomics Institute of the Novartis Research Foundation, publishing the first haplotype map of mouse inbred strains. After establishing his own laboratory at the Scripps Research Institute in Florida and acting as the director of its Genetics and Genomics Core Facility, Mathew joined Pfizer Global Research and Development, eventually serving as Director of Medical Genetics for Pfizer's Rare Disease Research Unit.
More recently, Mathew served as the Chief Science Officer for Autism Speaks, the world's largest advocacy and research organization for autism. As part of this role, he led MSSNG, a collaboration between Autism Speaks, Google and the Hospital for Sick Children, to make available in an open-access database more than 10,000 whole genome sequences from families with autism. Prior to arriving at Astellas Gene Therapies, he served as the Head of Rare Disease directing early development and research activities for rare neuromuscular, neurodevelopmental, ophthalmological, neurodegenerative, and hematopoietic diseases including Angelman syndrome, spinal muscular atrophy, choroideremia, spinocerebellar ataxia, and Huntington disease. He has also founded the RDH12 Fund for Sight, a non-profit organization devoted to the development of a gene therapy for a genetic form of Leber Congenital Amaurosis, a congenital blinding disorder; is a board member of Odylia Therapeutics, a non-profit enterprise focused on developing gene therapies for ultra-rare diseases; and holds an adjunct faculty appointment with the University of North Carolina.