Our Company
Makana Therapeutics (originally known as Xenobridge, LLC) was founded in 2009 by Joe Tector, MD, PhD, FACS. The son of a Cardiothoracic Transplant surgeon, Dr. Tector became interested in the field of Transplantation at an early age. However, there were a few key moments that shaped his future career. First, when making inpatient rounds with his father, he noticed that some families in the waiting room were celebrating, and some families were not. It became clear that transplantation is a wonderful, life altering event for some people, but the opportunity doesn’t exist for everyone. Second, in 1984, he saw Dr. Leonard Bailey transplant a baboon heart into “Baby Fae”, an infant who had hypoplastic left heart syndrome. That watershed moment pushed him to pursue the development of a new source of organs.
Dr. Tector, is currently a Professor of Surgery and Director of Xenotransplant research at the Miami Transplant Institute in South Florida. He has dedicated his career to solving the organ shortage through xenotransplantation. Because of Dr. Tector’s visionary leadership, Makana was founded in order to create a new source of donor organ for those in desperate need. Over 17 people die per day while waiting for an organ transplant, and the Makana team is focused to deliver products that save human lives.