Mark F. de Groot
Mark is the Managing Director of Virage Capital, which provides advisory services relating to the financing and formation of funds, companies and other investment vehicles. Virage works with investors, fund sponsors, and company management.
Mark was until 2009 the CEO of the venture capital fund iNovia Capital, which he founded in 2002 and which currently has in excess of $200M under management. He started and ran the first seed-stage life sciences venture capital fund in Canada while working at a life sciences fund with $1B under management, and has also been instrumental in establishing two other investment funds in Canada.
Mark has worked extensively in the technology and the life sciences sectors at the company level. His experience in the former sector includes having held senior positions in a healthcare IT company and the informatics division of a life sciences company. He was also a co-founder of two software companies. In the life sciences sector he has held senior positions at early-stage biopharmaceutical companies and a pharmaceutical multinational.
Mark is on the Advisory Committee of the Lyceum Group, a non-profit Canadian development organization active in Africa, which focuses on projects that are driven by local demand, utilize indigenous staff and address the needs of the disadvantaged.
He obtained his M.Sc. from Trinity College, University of Toronto and a Ph.D. in Physics from Oxford University, thereafter doing post-doctoral research at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. He is a keen participant in a variety of different organized sports.