MCLEAN, Va.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Apr 21, 2026--
Zephyr AI, Inc. (“Zephyr AI”), a leader in precision medicine harnessing artificial intelligence to accelerate drug development, today announced that it has appointed Lisa Eli, PhD, as its Chief Scientific Officer. Eli brings over 20 years of experience in translational medicine and precision oncology, with deep expertise in advancing biomarker-driven clinical development. She has led integrated biomarker and diagnostic strategies across Phase 1-3 clinical trials, enabling patient selection, informing combination approaches, and supporting regulatory approvals and guideline inclusions in solid tumors. At Zephyr AI, Dr. Eli will leverage this experience to accelerate AI-powered, biomarker-driven diagnostic and clinical development of targeted therapies.
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“I am thrilled to join Zephyr AI and support the company's groundbreaking work in oncology discovery and drug development,” said Eli. “The power of AI combined with deeply profiled real-world data offers an immense opportunity to accelerate clinical development and bring biomarker-informed, precise therapies to point of care. I am eager to work with our industry partners to help optimize treatment and elevate the quality of care for people with cancer.”
“Lisa is a key addition to Zephyr AI’s leadership team,” said Zephyr AI CEO Allen Chao, PhD. “She brings a wealth of experience advancing oncology programs from scientific discovery through clinical development and commercialization, and her leadership will energize Zephyr’s ability to apply proprietary data, AI, and machine learning to accelerate smarter drug development.”
As a thought leader in precision oncology, Dr. Eli has led translational medicine teams and supported important developments in cancer treatment. Most recently, Eli founded and led Eli Precision Oncology, LLC, a consultancy where she supported clients in biomarker-driven patient stratification and clinical development strategies. Prior to that, Eli was Vice President of Translational Medicine and Diagnostics at Puma Biotechnology, where she was a key driver of the SUMMIT basket trial of neratinib (Nerlynx®) for patients with solid tumors harboring HER2 mutations. She also held senior roles at N-of-One and Monogram Biosciences, where she supported diagnostic development of HERmark®, a tissue-based assay for HER2 quantitation. In addition, Eli was an appointed member of the California Breast Cancer Research Council and currently serves as an Advisor for the SPARK Program in Translational Research at Stanford.
Eli received a Ph.D. in Biochemistry from Stanford University, and completed her postdoctoral fellowship at UCSF.
About Zephyr AI
Zephyr AI is redefining precision medicine with AI-enabled software and enterprise-scale real-world data. By transforming fragmented clinical and biological information into actionable insights, Zephyr AI advances therapeutic development, patient stratification, and diagnostic innovation—bringing clarity to complexity and impact to patients. Zephyr AI’s solutions integrate seamlessly into existing workflows for rapid validation and clinical translation. Alongside its software models, Zephyr AI provides access to one of the world’s largest proprietary multimodal clinicogenomic datasets—enabling partners to explore populations, accelerate discovery, and improve trial success. For more information, visit zephyrai.bio.
Lisa Eli, PhD
MIAMI (AP) — A close ally of ousted Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro was charged Monday with bribing top officials to steal hundreds of millions of dollars from lucrative contracts to import food at a time of widespread hardship in the South American country.
Alex Saab made his initial court appearance after being deported over the weekend by acting President Delcy Rodríguez as part of a purge of insider businessmen who are believed to have enriched themselves through corrupt dealings with Maduro.
Shackled and wearing a beige prison uniform, Saab answered “Yes, ma'am,” in English after being asked by a federal judge in Miami whether he understood the charges against him: a single count of money laundering tied to a decade-old conspiracy to create fake companies, falsify shipping records and skim from government contracts to import food from Colombia and Mexico.
Saab, 54, was previously charged during the first Trump administration in 2019 and then arrested during a refueling stop in Cape Verde on what the Venezuelan government described as a high-level humanitarian mission to Iran.
But President Joe Biden pardoned him in 2023 in exchange for the release of several imprisoned Americans in Venezuela. The deal, part of a failed effort by the Biden White House to lure Maduro into holding a free presidential election, was harshly criticized by Republicans and federal law enforcement officials, who immediately began investigating Saab for other alleged crimes not covered by the narrowly tailored pardon.
U.S. officials have long described Saab as Maduro's “bag man” and could ask him to serve as a valuable character witness against his former protector, who is awaiting trial on drug charges in Manhattan after being captured in a raid by the U.S. military in January.
The new U.S. prosecution of Saab is taking place against the backdrop of the Trump administration’s efforts to overhaul relations with Venezuela.
Trump and senior administration officials have heaped praise on Rodríguez, who has thrown open Venezuela's oil industry to U.S. investment at a time of surging oil prices tied to the war in Iran. In exchange, the White House has dampened talk of elections, which are required by Venezuela's constitution within 30 days of the president becoming “permanently unavailable.”
But Rodríguez faces enormous domestic pressures from the more radical, ideological wing of the ruling socialist party, some of whom, like Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello, wield great influence inside Venezuelan security forces and face criminal charges themselves in the U.S.
Mario Silva, who for years spread pro-government propaganda as the host of a program on state TV before being removed from the airwaves after Maduro's capture, questioned the legality of Saab's removal, saying it violates a constitutional ban on extradition.
“The imperialists don't negotiate. They conquer, test and probe — until our country shatters,” said Silva in a livestream posted Sunday on social media. “Nobody is safe right now.”
Cabello, for his part, expressed support for Saab's deportation, saying he had obtained his Venezuela national ID through illegal means.
Perhaps anticipating blowback, Venezuela's immigration authority, SAIME, in a statement Saturday referred to Saab only as a “Colombian citizen" implicated in several criminal investigations in the U.S. Rodríguez on state TV Monday echoed those sentiments, saying she was committed to defending Venezuela's national interests.
Rodríguez heaped on Saab a few years ago during the international campaign Venezuela's government mounted to free him from U.S. custody. Serving then as Maduro's vice president, she described Saab as an “innocent Venezuelan diplomat” who had been illegally “kidnapped” by the U.S.
But as Rodríguez cements her rule, she has distanced herself from Saab, firing him from her Cabinet and stripping him of his role as the main conduit for foreign companies looking to invest in Venezuela.
Saab amassed a fortune through Venezuelan government contracts. The indictment against him in 2019 was tied to a government contract for low-income housing that was never built.
The new indictment stems from another case the Justice Department brought against Saab’s longtime partner over the so-called CLAP program set up by Maduro to provide staples — rice, corn flour, cooking oil — to poor Venezuelans at a time of rampant hyperinflation and a crumbling currency.
Saab had been identified in the 2021 indictment as “Co-Conspirator 1” and allegedly helped set up a web of companies used to bribe a pro-Maduro governor who awarded the business partners a contract to import food boxes from Mexico at an inflated price.
As U.S. sanctions crippled Venezuela’s foreign trade, Saab and others allegedly expanded their corrupt influence deep inside the Maduro government, accessing billions of dollars in oil sales from state-run oil company PDVSA, prosecutors said in a five-page indictment unsealed Monday.
Now in U.S. custody, he could be asked to testify against his former protector — something he has considered in the past.
Saab secretly met with the Drug Enforcement Administration before his first arrest and, in a closed-door court hearing in 2022, his lawyers revealed that the businessman for years had helped the DEA untangle corruption in Maduro’s inner circle. As part of that cooperation, he forfeited more than $12 million in illegal proceeds from dirty business dealings.
AP writer Regina Garcia Cano in Mexico City and Eric Tucker in Washington contributed to this report.
This story is part of an investigation that includes the FRONTLINE documentary “Crisis in Venezuela,” which aired Feb. 10, 2026, on PBS. Watch the documentary at pbs.org/frontline, in the PBS App and on FRONTLINE’s YouTube channel.
FILE - Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro, left, and Alex Saab stand together during an event marking the anniversary of the 1958 coup that overthrew dictator Marcos Perez Jimenez, in Caracas, Venezuela, Jan. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Jesus Vargas, File)
