New advisors and senior hires strengthen regulatory, clinical, and partnership capabilities

SAN DIEGO, June 17, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Acurion, a precision oncology company developing AI-powered technologies for cancer biomarker discovery and detection, today announced the expansion of its leadership, board, and advisory team following its recently completed $4.3 million oversubscribed seed financing.

The appointments strengthen Acurion's scientific, clinical, regulatory, and commercialization expertise as the company advances its OncoGaze™ platform toward clinical deployment and broader adoption.

New appointments:

Mike Hoerres, M.S., joins as Advising Chief Commercial Officer. As CEO of Cernostics, he led the development and commercialization of TissueCypher and the company's acquisition by Castle Biosciences.

David Schlessinger, Ph.D., MBA, joins as Vice President of Product Development. He previously held leadership positions at Natera and Exact Sciences, helping advance molecular diagnostics from development through commercialization.

Heather Jalisi joins as VP of Regulatory Affairs. She brings more than two decades of regulatory leadership experience across diagnostics and medical technology, including roles at Leica Biosystems, Amalgam Rx, Becton Dickinson, and Naviscan.

Leandra Boysen, MBA, joins as Sr. Director of Strategic Partnerships. She has led strategic partnerships and business development initiatives across the biotechnology ecosystem, including roles at Syner-G Biopharma, Sequoia Biotech, and Biocom.

Rick Schmitt joins as VP of Technology Operations. He brings decades of technology leadership experience spanning healthcare, biotechnology, and enterprise systems, including roles at Biocom, Neurocrine, and Illumina.

Mariya Kazachkova, Ph.D., joins as Senior Machine Learning Scientist. A member of founding CSO Ludmil Alexandrov's laboratory at UC San Diego, she recently defended her Ph.D. and previously served as an Associate Computational Biologist at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard.

Acurion is also pleased to welcome the following distinguished leaders to its Board of Directors and Strategic Advisory Board:

Irwin Jacobs, M.Sc., D.Sc., joins as Strategic Scientific Advisor. Dr. Jacobs is the co-founder, and former CEO and chairman of Qualcomm.

Eric Winer, M.D., joins as Strategic Medical Advisor. Dr. Winer is Director of the Yale Cancer Center and former president and chair of ASCO.

Tomas Koch, Ph.D., joins Acurion's Board of Directors following the company's recent financing. Dr. Koch is a board director in listed companies, and the Chairman of TK Partners. He spent more than three decades at McKinsey & Company, where he served as a senior partner and senior advisor to leading institutions worldwide.

Ho Sung Cho, Ph.D., joins as Strategic Scientific Advisor. Dr. Cho previously served as Senior Vice President of Discovery Biotherapeutics at Bristol Myers Squibb.

"These additions reflect the caliber of expertise required to build clinically meaningful AI tools capable of transforming patient care," said Rick Fultz, CEO of Acurion. "We have assembled a team with deep experience across oncology, diagnostics, regulatory strategy, and enterprise technology to support Acurion's next phase of growth."

Acurion's platform builds on research led by co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer Ludmil Alexandrov, Ph.D., whose work in cancer genomics has helped shape understanding of mutational processes and treatment response.

"Building lasting institutions requires both a telescope and a microscope - a long-term vision of the possible and a razor-sharp focus on quarterly results" added Tomas Koch, Ph.D., Acurion Board Member.

The company continues to expand clinical collaborations and expects to announce additional partnerships later this year.

About Acurion

Acurion is a San Diego-based precision oncology company developing AI-powered image analysis tools for biomarker detection, uncovering clinically actionable insights from conventional pathology images. Unlike genomic testing approaches often requiring additional tissue or specialized molecular testing, Acurion's OncoGaze™ platform extracts biomarker insights from routine pathology slides prepared during standard clinical care, enabling an instantaneous, scalable and accessible approach to precision medicine.

Despite major advances in targeted therapies, many cancer patients either lack access to biomarker testing or face life-threatening delays. Acurion aims to expand access to precision oncology by improving biomarker detection and treatment selection across multiple advanced cancer types.

For more information visit:
www.acurionhealth.com

Media Contact
Catherine Eng
ceng@acurionhealth.com
818-795-7184

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SOURCE Acurion