Lodestar Oncology Advisors

Why Lodestar

An advisor with drug discovery experience and deep cancer biology background

Biotechs often bring on a prominent academic advisor for input on the platform or pipeline. Having sat in those meetings, I have noticed a pattern: the advisor's calendar rarely allows for the deep review that would deliver meaningful insights. The internal scientific team is often left wanting more substantive input.

Lodestar is built for that gap: an experienced advisor who thinks out of the box and is recognized for uncovering hidden biological insights.

Focus areas

Advisory built around discovery-stage decisions

Engagements are scoped to a specific decision: a target to progress, a screen to design, a platform to build out. The advice is grounded on hands-on discovery experience, not general strategy.

Target selection

The right target is required for tumor maintenance and has a biomarker associated with the tumor that explains the selective dependency.

What that produces: a ranked list of targets, each scored against dependency evidence and a biomarker rationale.

Target identification

Beyond evaluating what internal teams have, novel targets can be proposed. Each new target idea comes with a defined therapeutic hypothesis and a concrete, testable path to validation.

Typical output: a shortlist of candidate targets, each with a one-page thesis and a defined validation experiment.

Druggability & tractability assessment

Structural review of binding pockets and protein–protein interaction surfaces to judge whether a target suits a small molecule, a degrader, or a molecular glue approach, and which is worth pursuing first.

The deliverable: a structural review flagging which targets suit a small molecule, a degrader, or a glue, and which don't.

Hit finding screens

Genetic (CRISPR, RNAi) screening strategies and chemical (biochemical, cellular, phenotypic) screen strategies, with particular expertise in induced-proximity and covalent hit-finding screens.

In practice: a screening plan covering assay format, library, and controls, sized to the biology and the modality.

Hit-to-lead / lead optimization assay cascade

Assay cascade design that carries validated hits through hit-to-lead and lead optimization, sequenced for potency, selectivity, and mechanism confirmation rather than run as a generic panel.

Comes back as: an assay cascade sequenced from primary screen through mechanism confirmation, ready to hand to chemistry.

Competitive landscape and differentiation

Analysis of the clinical path by determining the unmet medical need of the targeted population and comparing the new treatment to the standard of care and other programs in development.

End result: a competitive map and a one-page differentiation argument for the program.

Clients

Who turns to Lodestar

Teams and investors at very different stages of an oncology program, all facing the same question: is this target worth the bet?

AI-native discovery companies

Models surface candidate targets faster than a lean biology team can validate them. An outside read triages the list against genetic and mechanistic evidence before wet-lab resourcing follows. That can include directing CRO work to experimentally validate what the model predicts.

Often looks like: a short sprint validating the top model-ranked targets before committing wet-lab time to any of them.

Incoming CEOs & entrepreneurs-in-residence

Founding a company before the scientific team exists. Help building the initial pipeline around the company's strategy.

A typical ask: a short list of targets with clear scientific rationale.

New platform companies

A platform (degrader, glue, or otherwise) is only as good as the targets chosen to prove it out. The work is ranking candidate targets and indications against what the modality can actually do.

What this usually means: narrowing a long list of candidate indications down to the few the platform is actually built to hit.

Academic laboratories

Screens to identify hits against a lab's target or pathway, and assays to validate and optimize those hits. The aim is moving a discovery from bench biology toward a drug discovery program.

One example: designing a hit-finding screen sized to what an academic budget and timeline can actually support.

VCs in diligence

An independent scientific read on a program's target thesis or a founder's pitch, before a term sheet is signed.

The shape of it: a focused, days-long read on a single target thesis ahead of a partner meeting.

BD teams

In-licensing or partnership evaluations need a fast, independent read on the target or platform science, separate from the deal team driving the negotiation.

Most often: a focused diligence read on a target or platform's science before terms are negotiated.

Founder

Agustin Chicas, Ph.D. LinkedIn

20+

Years in oncology drug discovery

Discovery platforms

Peer-reviewed publications

First-author papers

Twenty-plus years of oncology drug discovery experience spanning academia and industry. The academic work focused on the role of tumor suppressors (RB, p53), oncogenes (RAS), and epigenetic regulators in cancer and cellular senescence, published in Cancer Cell, Genes & Development, PNAS, and Nature. The drug discovery experience spans four biotechs, each built around a different discovery platform. Most recently Head of Early Discovery at Expedition Medicines. Previously, founding member and Head of Discovery Biology at Monte Rosa Therapeutics. Earlier, Head of the Target Discovery group at Forma Therapeutics. Author of 20 peer-reviewed publications, including 7 first-author articles. Named inventor on patents related to the GSPT1 program and work at Third Rock Ventures.

Expedition Medicines

Covalent small-molecule and generative-chemistry platform. Head of Early Discovery — built and led a 7-person team across multiple therapeutic areas, target validation through in vivo proof-of-concept.

Monte Rosa Therapeutics

Molecular glue degrader platform. Founding member; Head of Discovery Biology — built an 11-person team advancing GSPT1 (clinical) and CCNE1 and CDK2 (lead optimization).

Third Rock Ventures

Consultant, Discovery & Translational Oncology — target assessment and strategy for new biotech ventures.

Forma Therapeutics

Deubiquitinase-focused platform. Established and led the Target Discovery group; identified the USP1–BRCA1 synthetic lethality.

H3 Biomedicine

Functional genomics and RNAi/CRISPR screening platform. Head of Laboratory, Target Discovery & Genomics — built screening platforms for synthetic lethal target discovery.

Oncology targets with a clear clinical path.