Matthew Hepburn served for 23 years in the United States Army as an infectious diseases physician, retiring as a Colonel. This service was followed by 5 years as DoD civilian, and more recently working with biotechnology companies in the private sector.
Matt’s broad and deep experience in strategy, executive leadership, program management and implementation have all aimed at mitigating the impact of infectious diseases and pandemics on our Nation. His experience as COVID Vaccine Lead for Operation Warp Speed inspired him to ensure another pandemic never happens again.
“One of the core lessons of my prior experience is that the right combination of unselfish people with a focused mission and momentum are the key ingredients to progress.”
Education and previous work
Matt received his Doctorate in Medicine and Bachelor of Science in biomedical engineering from Duke University. He completed his infectious disease fellowship and internal medicine residency training at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas, where he served as internal medicine chief of residents.
Early in his career, Matt established a clinical research unit at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID), where he later served as Clinical Research Director, leading domestic and international clinical research efforts on biodefense products. This role entailed extensive service with the Cooperative Threat Reduction program in the republics of the former Soviet Union.
Expanding the scope of his work into the policy sphere, Matt served as Director for Medical Preparedness at the National Security Council, where he completed the first National Strategy for Biosurveillance. He then spent nearly seven years as a program manager at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). Concurrent with his first two years at DARPA, he also served at the Research, Development and Acquisitions Directorate at the Defense Health Agency.
During his time at DOD, Matt also supported the DOD Joint Program Executive Office (JPEO) as Chief Medical Officer for CBRN Defense, and as Joint Project Lead of Enabling Biotechnologies. In this latter role, he was responsible for establishing a start-to-finish capability to develop vaccines and therapeutic solutions against current future biological threats. Following the creation of this foundational capability, the team implemented the DoD Vaccine Acceleration Project, which provides key investments to advance vaccines and antibody therapeutic efforts, with special emphasis on acceleration of manufacturing these products and clinical trials.
During the Covid pandemic, Matt took on the role of Vaccine Development Lead for the Countermeasures Acceleration Group (CAG), formerly known as Operation Warp Speed to help accelerate the development of COVID-19 vaccines. He would later go on to complete an assignment as the Senior Advisor to the Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) for pandemic preparedness, and as Senior Advisor for the White House Office of Pandemic Preparedness and Response.
More recently, Matt was Executive VP, R&D for Panther Life Sciences, working on better delivery mechanisms for drugs and vaccines. He is now a Senior Partner with Avinora, advising and helping make connections for a variety of clients interested in pandemic preparedness and health.
Matt also served as Chief Medical Officer, Level 2 Treatment facility in Iraq (2009-2010), for which he earned a Bronze Star. He maintains his medical licensure for clinical practice in internal medicine and infectious disease in the Military Health System.