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Niall O’Donnell is a managing director at RiverVest Venture Partners, where he has spent two decades building and investing in early-stage biopharmaceutical companies and working with entrepreneurs to advance innovative therapies for patients with significant unmet medical needs.
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Niall O’Donnell, Ph.D.
MANAGING DIRECTOR
SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIAJOINED IN 2006
Niall O’Donnell, Ph.D., joined RiverVest in 2006 as a Kauffman Fellow and associate and was promoted to managing director in 2014. Since joining the firm, Niall has played a key role in developing and shaping RiverVest’s biopharmaceutical strategy. He has co-founded five biopharmaceutical companies, directed clinical strategy, co-authored key patents, and worked closely with entrepreneurs to advance innovative therapies that address significant unmet medical needs. Among the RiverVest portfolio companies Niall has built and guided, four have been acquired and four have completed initial public offerings.
As a portfolio company co-founder, Niall served as interim CEO of Reneo Pharmaceuticals and interim chief medical officer of Lumena Pharmaceuticals prior to its 2014 acquisition by Shire, now part of Takeda. In 2018, he worked to reclaim Lumena’s assets from Takeda to co-found Mirum Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: MIRM), where he helped shape the scientific strategy and assemble the leadership team that brought LIVMARLI® to market.
Niall also co-founded and developed clinical strategy for Curzion Pharmaceuticals, acquired by Horizon Therapeutics in 2020, and Excaliard Pharmaceuticals, acquired by Pfizer in 2011. He currently serves on the boards of Atalanta Therapeutics, Engrail Therapeutics, Glycomine, Sparrow Pharmaceuticals, and Allotera Therapeutics (formerly Wugen). He also serves as a member of the Board of Advisors at the University of California, Davis Graduate School of Management.
Prior to joining RiverVest, Niall spent four years as an immunologist at Johnson & Johnson Pharmaceutical Research and Development in San Diego, where he advanced small-molecule anti-inflammatory drugs into clinical trials. His scientific training and early industry experience led him to pursue an MBA to better understand the commercial and investment decisions involved in translating scientific innovation into new medicines.
Niall earned a Ph.D. in biochemistry from the University of Dundee in Scotland and an M.A. in biochemistry from Pembroke College, University of Oxford. He completed his postdoctoral training at the University of California, San Diego, and later earned an MBA from UC San Diego’s Rady School of Management. In 2024, the Rady School awarded Niall the Sullivan Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation Achievement Award (watch video).