John Sima Jr. oversees the strategy, direction, culture, and financial health of Cogent Scientific, and has led the company for nearly a decade. Under his leadership, Cogent has grown from a single-site support company into a coast-to-coast, preferred embedded-science partner, a transformation he attributes to building a culture that puts people first, allowing Cogent to fully support its clients. John is a CPA and holds a B.S. in Mathematics and Business from Belhaven University and an MBA from Virginia Tech, a combination that shapes his emphasis on financial discipline alongside people-centered leadership. He is personally invested in Cogent's client relationships, believing executive-level attention and follow-through separate a true partner from a vendor. Outside of Cogent, John is deeply engaged in supporting individuals both locally and internationally, work that reflects the same care-first philosophy he brings to the company. As a member of Cogent's Advisory Board, he helps ensure the company's strategic decisions stay grounded in the day-to-day realities of running the business and serving its scientific teams.

Tom Wood works with Cogent Scientific's senior leadership team to define and execute the company's go-to-market strategy, focusing on expanding and diversifying Cogent's presence across large and middle-market pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies in North America. He brings 40 years of experience in consulting and professional services, much of it spent helping regulated pharmaceutical, medical device, and biotechnology organizations plan and implement go-to-market strategies and technology solutions. Over that career, Tom has learned that the most meaningful measure of success isn't on time and on budget; it's the difference the work makes downstream, in outcomes like more effective diabetes management or vaccines delivered during the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic. He holds a degree in Accounting & Finance with a Computer Science minor from Indiana University and an MBA from the University of Indianapolis. Tom's priorities outside of work are faith, family, and football: he has spent more than 20 years coaching youth football, including 15 years with the Carmel Pups travel team, teaching young athletes the physical, mental, and spiritual dimensions of the game. As a Senior Strategic Advisor, he brings that same long view to Cogent's growth.

Josh Moon leads Cogent Scientific's commercial strategy and business development, helping life sciences organizations identify where an embedded scientific team can improve capacity, continuity, and execution while keeping their work, knowledge, and intellectual property in-house. He builds the account strategies, commercial systems, and client relationships that support Cogent's growth. Before joining Cogent, Josh held commercial and strategic leadership roles at ProductLife Group, WEP Clinical, and ActiGraph (now Ametris), with experience spanning drug development consulting, regulatory and clinical services, and decentralized data capture. He began his career in research operations at The Ohio State University, which gave him a grounded, practical understanding of how scientific teams actually operate. Josh has built and led commercial initiatives that contributed to more than $60 million in pipeline growth, 28 new client relationships, and 31 account expansions, and at Cogent he has helped lay the commercial foundation for the company's next stage of growth. He holds a bachelor's degree in Business Administration and a master's degree in Translational Pharmacology, both from Ohio State, along with a certificate in Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare from Stanford University School of Medicine. Outside of work, Josh is an ultramarathon runner and a former internationally touring musician.

Angela Bridges leads Cogent Scientific's Candidate Relationships team, where she finds talented scientists and trains others to do the same. She brings more than 25 years of experience at two of the country's top scientific recruiting and staffing companies, in both recruiter and management roles, developing talent acquisition strategies for Fortune 500 clients before bringing that expertise to Cogent. Angela was an integral part of the team that expanded Cogent Scientific to seven additional sites around the country. She holds a B.S. in Chemistry from Indiana State University and completed MBA coursework, giving her a scientific foundation that shapes how she evaluates candidates. Angela is dedicated to finding professional scientists who embody Cogent's values and deliver excellent work for clients, believing that the right people, well matched, are what make an embedded team succeed. Outside of work, Angela has been married to her husband Levi for nearly 30 years, and together they are the proud parents of two sons, Logan and Noah. She has also been involved in jail and prison ministry for more than a decade.

Valerie Rieger leads Cogent Scientific's People Operations team, where she builds the programs, processes, and infrastructure the company needs to grow while still supporting the day-to-day needs of Cogent's staff and clients. She brings nearly 30 years of experience in People Operations and HR across established and growing organizations in a range of industries, with deep expertise in HR strategy, employee relations, and employee experience. Valerie is most proud of the work she has done throughout her career to build and strengthen HR functions that help organizations grow and evolve, creating structure where it was needed, improving the employee experience, and building people practices that support both staff and the business. She holds a B.S. in Political Science and a Master of Public Administration, both from Columbus State University in Columbus, Georgia. Valerie believes a people-focused approach to supporting Cogent's staff is what ultimately strengthens the company's client relationships: when expectations are clear and staff have the support they need to succeed, that stability shows up in the work. Outside of Cogent, she enjoys spending time with her family, crafting, and serving her community. She is the proud wife of a Soldier for Life, a band mom, and grandmother to two granddaughters.

Andy Dahlem provides scientific and business insight to Cogent Scientific, along with strategic input to sustain and grow the company. He brings more than 35 years of leadership and business experience at large pharmaceutical companies, including 28 years at Eli Lilly and Company as Vice President and Chief Operating Officer, Lilly Research Laboratories, where he led research labs in Europe and the US, built a research center in Shanghai, China, and delivered strong portfolio results over many years. Andy has started several companies, served on numerous boards including as board chair, and led organizational strategy and redesign across multiple leadership roles. He has direct experience with both insourcing and outsourcing, having served on strategic oversight committees for critical outsourcing decisions, knowledge that translates directly into his advisory role at Cogent. He holds a B.S. in Wildlife Biology from The Ohio State University, a Ph.D. in Toxicology, ADME, and Pharmacokinetics from the University of Illinois College of Veterinary Medicine, and a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine (honoris causa) from Purdue University. Andy currently serves as a Senior Research Professor in the College of Medicine at Indiana University, where he helps entrepreneurs start companies. Outside of work, he enjoys spending time with his children and grandchildren, as well as fishing, hiking, and other outdoor activities.

Raul Zavaleta provides strategic advice, business-community networking, and external consulting to Cogent Scientific's leadership. His expertise includes business formation and growth, maximizing enterprise value ahead of an acquisition, recognizing pivotal moments in a company's growth that call for organizational change, and building relationships across the business community. Raul brings deep experience as a CRO provider to pharmaceutical companies and has served as CEO, CTO, and COO across multiple life sciences companies. He is a co-founder of Covance, where he helped lead the company's international expansion, and has successfully guided six businesses through an exit. Raul holds a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from UCLA and an honorary doctorate from Marian University, along with IT credentials in database design and project management. He has served on numerous community boards, including the Indianapolis Chamber of Commerce, the Indianapolis Arts Council, Indiana Sports Corp, United Way of Central Indiana, and the Marian University Board of Trustees. Raul brings a rare combination of scientific grounding and business operations experience to Cogent's Advisory Board, a perspective that is especially valuable as the company plans its next stage of growth. Outside of work, he enjoys golf, traveling, and reading.

Steve Fakhoury helps build and develop Cogent Scientific's individual site leadership teams and the company's combined leadership team. His scientific expertise spans small-molecule drug design, synthetic organic chemistry, small-molecule purification, irreversible enzyme inhibitors, and correlating molecular properties to design compounds suited to specific routes of administration. Before Cogent, Steve spent his career in medicinal chemistry at SmithKline, Abbott, and Pfizer, and worked on fluorescently tagged small molecules as tool compounds at Life Technologies. He is a co-inventor of dacomitinib (Vizimpro®), an approved treatment for non-small cell lung cancer, work that reflects the kind of high-stakes precision Cogent's scientists bring to embedded lab programs. Steve holds a B.S. in Chemistry from the University of Missouri and completed graduate studies in Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Kansas. In his current role, Steve brings a rare combination to Cogent's site leadership teams: real scientific credibility earned at the bench, decades of longevity in the field, and a relational, hands-on style of engagement that builds trust with site leaders. That mix is what allows him to bring stability to Cogent's leadership teams and help every location operate with the same rigor and accountability. Outside of work, Steve most enjoys spending time with family and friends, particularly his grandchildren.

Steve Fields serves as the external face of Cogent Scientific across several of the company's East Coast and West Coast partner sites, representing Cogent's embedded scientific teams to the institutions they support. His technical expertise spans synthetic organic chemistry and methodology, spectral interpretation and chemical structure determination, intellectual property protection, and early-stage discovery research. Steve brings decades of recruiting experience at every level, deep knowledge of the CRO landscape from having worked both alongside and inside one (WuXi AppTec), years in scientific people-management roles, and experience as a patent consultant. Earlier in his career, the research team he led at Dow AgroSciences (now Corteva) discovered a new class of herbicides that produced two active ingredients, florpyrauxifen benzyl and halauxifen methyl, now sold under dozens of product names and generating more than $1 billion in combined annual sales, with the research program continuing for more than 20 years. He holds 25-plus peer-reviewed publications and more than 20 patents, along with a B.S. in Chemistry from Bucknell University and a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Steve played Division I soccer in college and had a short semi-professional stint in graduate school; today, he enjoys rehabbing houses.

Dave Davis leads chemistry support for a partner institution's synthetic innovation program and provides leadership to chemists and other leaders across Cogent Scientific's Synthetic Chemistry and Lab Services teams. His expertise covers organic synthesis, catalysis, method development from pilot to multigram scale, chemistry automation, and notebook compliance. Before joining Cogent, Dave provided synthetic chemistry and automation support at AMRI. His synthetic work has enabled new steps and improved efficiency in chemistry routes used by his partner institution's medicinal chemistry teams, and since helping implement a compliance audit process, he has significantly reduced instances of notebook compliance violations across the group, the kind of quiet, structural improvement that keeps an embedded lab running smoothly. Dave holds a Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry from Westminster College and a Master of Science in Organic Chemistry from Kent State University. He brings the same rigor to leading people that he applies at the bench, mentoring chemists while keeping Cogent's lab operations compliant and efficient. Outside of work, Dave enjoys spending time with family and friends, reading, and gaming.

Hongdi Bai leads Cogent Scientific's analytical chemistry group specializing in chromatography, supporting chiral method development and purification work for a partner institution's Indianapolis site. His expertise includes chiral and achiral purification, chromatography, chiral method development, and supercritical fluid chromatography. Hongdi has spent more than 13 years at Cogent, experience that has shaped his approach to leading a diverse and nimble group: staying client-focused and employee-centered, communicating through multiple channels, keeping laboratory fundamentals safe and sound, and bringing genuine enthusiasm for science and discovery to the work every day. He holds a B.S. in Chemistry with a minor in Biology from Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI). His long tenure gives him an institutional memory that few can match — he has watched Cogent's embedded model evolve over more than a decade and uses that perspective to help his group navigate the technical and interpersonal demands of chromatography work at a fast-moving research site. Hongdi's steady, detail-oriented leadership reflects the kind of continuity Cogent's clients rely on.

Laura Edison supports high-throughput analysis screens used to identify potential drug discovery leads, and leads a group of Indianapolis-based Cogent Scientific team members working across biology and biology-adjacent disciplines, including cell culture, bioanalysis, and pharmacokinetics. Her strongest areas of expertise include small molecule LC-MS, high-throughput mass spectrometry analysis, and technical writing. Before Cogent, Laura worked in a medical technology lab and performed quality assurance testing for a major beverage company, experience that sharpened her attention to detail and process discipline. At Cogent, she has contributed to the method development of several small molecule assays that have been featured in internal science fairs and presentations at her partner institution. Laura holds a Bachelor of Science in Chemistry, with a minor in Forensic Science, from Purdue University. She works extensively with Sciex instrumentation and software and RapidFire-MS analysis, and her technical writing strength means her team's findings are communicated as clearly as they are rigorously produced. Outside of work, Laura's hobbies include crafting, baking, and gaming.

Stephanie Catron performs small molecule purifications and chiral separations using reverse-phase and normal-phase liquid chromatography, and splits her time between bench work and people leadership to help guide and grow Cogent Scientific's Colorado-based team. Her strongest asset may be her range: she is a fast problem-solver who can spot when something is off and knows exactly who to bring in when she can't resolve it herself, paired with deep analytical chemistry expertise. Stephanie's seniority with Cogent, including experience at three different sites, has given her firsthand insight into how the Cogent–client relationship evolves as it matures, and she has played a hands-on role in helping establish what kind of company Cogent is at newer sites. She was the driving force behind getting a partner institution's life sciences automation studio fully operational, resolving, or finding someone to resolve, the many gaps that emerged as its automated systems came online. Stephanie holds a B.S. in Biology, with a focus in Genetics and Biotechnology, from the University of Iowa, along with a Python Programming Certificate that supports her work on automation platforms. Outside of work, she's an avid adult-league volleyball and soccer player, wherever she happens to live.