Dr. Evan Melrose

With 27 years of experience in the Healthcare industry, Dr. Melrose possesses extensive operating, clinical, and investment experience in various aspects of healthcare investments (both public and private), research, clinical practice, education, and health policy.

As the Founding Managing Director of Spindletop Capital, Dr. Melrose is providing pivotal expansion capital for healthcare investments from his firm based in Austin. Prior to Spindletop, he was the Founding Managing Director of PTV Sciences, a Texas-based venture capital firm, and a Director with Burrill & Company, a San Francisco-based life science private equity/venture capital firm. While at Burrill he managed investments on behalf of limited partners including IBM, Aventis, Proctor & Gamble, ADM, and Bayer. Dr. Melrose has public board and operating experience including partnerships and IPOs. Current and prior board membership include IntersectENT (Nasdaq: XENT), Castle Bioscience (Nasdaq: CSTL), HNI Healthcare, Bioventus (Nasdaq: BVS),  Sanova Dermatology, Spindletop Pain Holdings,  Asuragen (acquired: TECH), BioSET (acquired: Ferring), BioForm Medical (Nasdaq: BFRM, acquired: MERZ),  Biomimetic Therapeutics (Nasdaq: BMTI, acquired: SYK), Inhibitex (Nasdaq: INHX, acquired: BMS), and Insite Vision (acquired: Sun Pharma).

He has held faculty appointments at UCSF, UPENN, and is currently at Baylor College of Medicine and cross-trained in medicine with Mayo Clinic, University of Miami, UVA, Georgetown and GW. His courses included, “From Idea to IPO” at the University of California, San Francisco, through support from the Kauffman Foundation; healthcare entrepreneurship classes at the University of Pennsylvania; and seminars for numerous organizations including the Young Presidents Organization and the Association of University Technology Managers. His primary care practice included obstetrics, pediatrics, and emergency medicine.

His research includes biomedical and medical device outcomes/comparative effectiveness research for the NIH and AHCPR. He has published in several medical journals including the Archives of Internal Medicine. Dr. Melrose’s honors include selection as an AMA Health Policy Fellow to work on Medicare reform on Capitol Hill; the first American United Life/Bowen Research Center Scholar (in honor of Dr. Otis Bowen, Secretary of HHS); and the AMA/Glaxo-Wellcome Leadership Award. National leadership roles include the American Academy of Family Physicians and the Association of American Medical Colleges. He initiated the Project Magic program at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, where magicians and PT aid in the rehabilitation of children by teaching them the art of magic. After Hurricane Katrina, he volunteered to care for patients in the Houston Astrodome. For the last decade, Dr. Melrose has been instrumental in healthcare and life science across the State of Texas.

He has been a board member and advisor to many organizations including BayBIO-BayBioNest, BioHouston, MD Anderson Technology Review Committee, BIO Investor Forum, MedTech Insight IN3, Texas Life Science Conference, Rice Alliance, and the $3B Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas and is a graduate of the Center for Houston’s Future Civic/Business Leadership forum. He was elected to the Texas Lyceum where he serves as a Director, was a member of the executive committee, and co-chaired the 2012 Public Conference on Healthcare Innovation. Dr. Melrose serves on the Board of Directors for the Texas Business Hall of Fame Foundation and the selection committee and is Vice President of the Endowment and Scholarships. He is a board member of the University of Texas Hillel Foundation and a member of YPO International.

Dr. Melrose received his BA from the University of Pennsylvania, received his MD from Indiana University School of Medicine, and an MBA from The Wharton School. He completed postgraduate studies at the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development, the University of Pennsylvania School of Engineering, at Harvard Medical and Law Schools, and Stanford Graduate School of Business, and is certified as Public Company Director by Institutional Shareholder Services/UCLA Anderson School of Business.

In 2013 the National Association of Corporate Directors (NACD) elected Dr. Melrose as an NACD Board Leadership Fellow, the highest level of credentialing for corporate directors and corporate governance professionals.  He is a member of YPO Gold Austin and the YPO Family Office Principals Group.  More recently, Dr. Melrose was selected as a Fellow of the Aspen Institute’s Health Innovators Fellowship and is a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network.