John Swartley, PhD, MBA

John Swartley, PhD, MBA is the Chief Innovation Officer of the University of Pennsylvania where he leads innovation initiatives across the entire institution. Previously, Dr. Swartley served as the Associate Vice Provost for Research and Managing Director of the Penn Center for Innovation (PCI) where he led a multi-faceted team focused on new product development, corporate partnerships, technology licensing and new venture creation based on faculty expertise and discoveries made at Penn. Prior to joining Penn in 2007, Dr. Swartley was Senior Vice President and General Partner of BCM Technologies (BCMT), the venture capital investment subsidiary of Baylor College of Medicine. Dr. Swartley joined BCMT in 2003 from the Yale University Office of Cooperative Research where he was Associate Director of the Medical Campus Office. Over the course of his career, Dr. Swartley has facilitated thousands of commercialization and research partnership agreements that have collectively generated nearly five billion dollars in licensing income and sponsored research funding, as well as participating in the formation and oversight of hundreds of university spin-out companies that have collectively raised several billion dollars of investment capital. He holds a B.S. in Biology from Bates College, an MBA from the Goizueta School of Business at Emory University, and a PhD in Microbial & Molecular Genetics from Emory University.