Caryn McDowel
Chief Legal Officer

Ms. McDowell is a seasoned legal executive with nearly 30 years of experience across both public and private life sciences companies. She has held senior leadership roles spanning a wide range of therapeutic areas, shaping corporate legal strategy, compliance, governance, and organizational leadership through all stages of drug development and commercialization. Her leadership experience includes serving as Chief Legal and Administrative Officer at Quince Therapeutics (formerly Cortexyme), where she oversaw legal, human resources, and administrative functions during a period of strategic transformation in neurology and rare disease. She has also held General Counsel and Corporate Secretary roles at Revance Therapeutics and Cytokinetics.

Earlier in her career, Ms. McDowell held senior legal positions at Genentech, InterMune, Onyx Pharmaceuticals, Affymax, and Millennium Pharmaceuticals. She began her career in public service with enforcement roles at the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office Medicaid Fraud Control Unit and the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services Office of Inspector General.

Ms. McDowell currently serves on the board of California Life Sciences and is a founding limited partner of How Women Invest. She holds a JD from Boston University School of Law and a BA in political science and Judaic studies from the University of Michigan.