CEO and co-founder of Formation Bio (formerly TrialSpark, formerly LabNook) — the company that operated Project Covalence, received Sam Altman’s nonprofit grant, and evolved from a COVID platform into a $1.8B AI-native pharmaceutical company generating €545M licensing deals.
Bio
Benjamine Liu is a computational biologist, neuroscientist, and Rhodes Scholar who co-founded Formation Bio — the company at the center of the nonprofit-to-commercial pipeline documented in this investigation. He received his DPhil at Oxford under Sir Simon Lovestone at the Translational Neuroscience and Dementia Research Group, where he used machine learning and AI to develop diagnostics and therapeutics for Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease. During his doctoral work, he developed a candidate blood test for Parkinson’s disease and identified several promising drug candidates for neurodegenerative disorders, but found that pharmaceutical companies repeatedly turned him away — not because of the science, but because they lacked the bandwidth to run additional clinical trials. [1][2][3]
This experience became the thesis behind TrialSpark: the bottleneck in drug development had shifted from discovery to clinical execution. In 2016, while still completing his doctorate, Liu co-founded TrialSpark with Linhao Zhang (a computer science graduate from UT Austin and former Salesforce/Oscar Health engineer) and Kit Dobyns (a Cornell graduate and fellow Rhodes Scholar at Oxford). Liu and Dobyns were assigned as roommates during the Rhodes Scholar pre-orientation program. Dobyns and Zhang first met as roommates during a Salesforce internship. [1][3][4]
Before TrialSpark, Liu graduated from Yale University with an Intensive BS in Biology, where he was awarded the Alpheus Henry Snow Prize (the college’s highest honor at graduation), the Goldwater Scholarship, and the Josephine de Karman Fellowship. He then received his MPhil with distinction in Computational Biology from the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics at Cambridge University as a Paul Mellon Fellow. [2][5][6]
Liu also serves as an Advisor to Harvard Business School’s MS/MBA Program in Biotechnology. [2]
Basic Information
| Field | Detail |
|---|---|
| Full Name | Benjamine Liu (goes by “Ben”) |
| Current Title | CEO and Co-Founder, Formation Bio |
| Company | Formation Bio, Inc. (formerly TrialSpark, Inc., formerly LabNook, Inc.) |
| Company Address | 16 E 34th St, Floor 10, New York, NY 10016 |
| Education | Yale BS Biology 2012 (Alpheus Henry Snow Prize); Cambridge MPhil Computational Biology 2012-2013 (Paul Mellon Fellow); Oxford DPhil Computational Biology & Psychiatry 2013-2016 (Rhodes Scholar) |
| Origin | Born in Taiwan. Immigrated to the United States as a child (per Forbes, 2022). Grew up in Westlake Village, California (suburban Los Angeles). Attended Westlake High School. |
| Doctoral Advisor | Sir Simon Lovestone — Professor of Translational Neuroscience, Oxford; knighted 2017; subsequently became Global Head of Discovery and Translational Research, Janssen Neuroscience (Johnson & Johnson) [7][8] |
| Research Group | Translational Neuroscience and Dementia Research Group, and ChenPloktin Lab, Department of Neurology, Oxford [9] |
| Research Focus | Parkinson’s disease diagnostics (candidate blood test), Alzheimer’s therapeutics, machine learning applied to neurodegeneration |
| Other Roles | Advisor, Harvard Business School MS/MBA Biotechnology program; co-founded ResearchWe [9][10] |
| Personal Blog | benliu.posthaven.com [11] |
| linkedin.com/in/benjamine-liu-54306518 |
The Oxford Circle
Liu’s Oxford period (2013-2016) produced the co-founding relationships and network connections that became TrialSpark. Multiple individuals in the same Oxford cohort went on to occupy significant positions.
| Person | Oxford Role | Current Position | Network Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Benjamine Liu | DPhil, Rhodes Scholar, Computational Biology & Psychiatry | CEO, Formation Bio | Founded LabNook → TrialSpark → Formation Bio |
| Kit Dobyns | Rhodes Scholar (Cornell), Refugee & Forced Migration Studies | Founded Cayaba Care (2019) | Liu’s assigned roommate at Rhodes pre-orientation. Co-founded TrialSpark. Left 2019. [1][4] |
| Jon Askonas | DPhil student | Fellow, Foundation for American Innovation (FAI) | FAI (formerly Lincoln Network) shapes Trump AI policy. FAI board includes Trump’s CTO. SVCF (Silicon Valley Community Foundation) funds FAI. SVCF also provided the anonymous $30M grant that was 99.7% of OpenAI nonprofit’s FY2019 revenue. [12] |
| Evan Szablowski | “Intelligence and Data Analysis Specialist, 2nd LT US Army” | Unknown | Founded BRTRS project at Oxford (domain never registered). Military intelligence officer in the same Oxford circle as Liu, Dobyns, and Askonas. [13] |
Liu’s doctoral advisor, Sir Simon Lovestone, left Oxford for Janssen/Johnson & Johnson as Global Head of Discovery and Translational Research for Neuroscience. [7][8] Lovestone co-founded the Oxford Dementia Drug Discovery Institute and was knighted in 2017 for services to neuroscience research. His research interests — biomarkers for clinical trials, AI/big data applied to drug development, and neurodegenerative disease — map directly onto TrialSpark/Formation Bio’s subsequent business model.
Company Evolution — Three Names, One Floor
| Period | Name | Description | Key Events |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2014-2016 | LabNook, Inc. | Research networking platform. Philadelphia address (23 S 23rd St Unit H). D&B classified as “Media Streaming, Social Networks” — not clinical trials. [14] | Delaware incorporation date contested: PA filing June 19, 2014 vs. founding date commonly listed as 2016. SEC CIK 0002028122 lists previous name as “LabNook, Inc.” [15] |
| 2016-2023 | TrialSpark, Inc. | Clinical trial technology platform → CRO → drug acquirer. NYC (16 E 34th St, Fl 10). [1] | Seed: Thrive Capital (Kushner) + Sequoia (Moritz). 23andMe partnership (Sep 2019). Project Covalence (Jun 2020). OpenResearch $1M grant (FY2020). Series C $156M led by Altman (Sep 2021). |
| 2023-present | Formation Bio, Inc. | AI-native pharmaceutical company. Same address. [2] | Rebrand Dec 5, 2023. Series D $372M led by a16z (Jul 2024). Muse platform with OpenAI + Sanofi (Nov 2024). Libertas Bio → Sanofi €545M (Jun 2025). |
ResearchWe was a separate clinical trial recruitment project founded by Dobyns and Zhang through AlphaLab (Pittsburgh accelerator, subsidiary of Innovation Works). AlphaLab lists TrialSpark/Formation Bio as one of its two unicorns. [16] ResearchWe merged with LabNook to form TrialSpark — combining Liu’s research networking platform with Dobyns/Zhang’s clinical trial recruitment engine.
Investor and Advisor Network
From Liu’s LinkedIn acknowledgment post and public filings: [2][17]
| Person | Role | Network Connection |
|---|---|---|
| Sam Altman | Series C co-lead; personal $19M stake (trial exhibit) | OpenResearch $1M → TrialSpark (Project Covalence). OpenAI → Formation Bio (Muse). |
| Michael Moritz | Sequoia seed investor | Green Dot board, SF Standard, Loopt acquisition — documented in circular dealing analysis |
| Joshua Kushner | Thrive Capital — seed, Series B, Series D investor | Brother of Jared Kushner |
| John Doerr | Personal investor | Kleiner Perkins; OpenAI board member |
| Mark Fishman | Project Covalence collaborator | Former NIBR president. NIBR alumni reunion through Covalence. See Project Covalence profile. |
| Paul Hudson | Sanofi CEO | Sanofi: Oct 2022 TrialSpark contract → Nov 2024 Muse launch → Jun 2025 Libertas Bio €545M license |
| Alex Gorsky | Former J&J CEO | Liu’s doctoral advisor Lovestone went to Janssen (J&J subsidiary) |
| Joe Jimenez | Former Novartis CEO | NIBR was Novartis’s research arm. Fishman was NIBR president. Somberg spent 12 years at Novartis. |
| Jay Parikh | Former Meta VP Infrastructure | Technology infrastructure connection |
| Lachy Groom | Series C co-lead with Altman | Former Stripe executive. Stripe is another Altman portfolio company ($633M stake). |
| Mikael Dolsten | Joined Formation Bio April 2025 | Former Pfizer Chief R&D Officer — oversaw COVID vaccine development [18] |
Investigative Findings
Finding 1: The Founding Date Discrepancy
The founding date of LabNook/TrialSpark is contested across sources:
| Source | Date Listed |
|---|---|
| Pennsylvania foreign corporation filing (Entity #4277202) | June 19, 2014 |
| SEC CIK record | Previous name “LabNook, Inc.” — no date |
| Crunchbase | June 2014 (later edited to June 2013) |
| Contrary Research / most press | 2016 |
| Liu’s own statements | “In 2016, while still completing his doctorate, Liu co-founded TrialSpark” [1] |
| Clay.com profile | “Co-founded Formation Bio in January 2014” [10] |
The PA filing (2014) and Liu’s public statements (2016) conflict by two years. The Crunchbase edit (changing 2014 to 2013) moves the date EARLIER, not later. Either LabNook was incorporated in 2014 while Liu was at Oxford and rebranded/relaunched in 2016, or the 2014 PA filing belongs to a different phase of the entity. The SEC CIK confirms “LabNook, Inc.” as a previous name of “TrialSpark, Inc.” — it’s the same entity. [14][15]
Finding 2: The D&B Classification Anomaly
Dun & Bradstreet classified LabNook as “Media Streaming Distribution Services, Social Networks, and Other Media Networks and Content Providers.” [14] This is the industry classification for companies like Netflix or Facebook — not clinical trial platforms. Either: (a) LabNook was originally built as a social/media networking product and pivoted to clinical trials, (b) the classification was never updated as the company evolved, or (c) the initial product genuinely straddled social networking and research (a “research social network” that later pivoted to clinical trial recruitment).
Liu’s about.me page describes TrialSpark as using “big data, analytics and social media campaigns to expedite clinical trial recruitment and facilitate patient engagement” — the social media component is explicit. [6]
Finding 3: The Doctoral Advisor → J&J Pipeline
Liu’s doctoral advisor, Sir Simon Lovestone, left Oxford for Janssen (Johnson & Johnson) as Global Head of Discovery and Translational Research for Neuroscience. [7][8] Former J&J CEO Alex Gorsky appears in Liu’s investor/advisor acknowledgments. [17]
Lovestone’s research interests — biomarkers for clinical trials, AI and big data applied to drug development, translational neuroscience — are essentially the Formation Bio business model. The student built a company around the advisor’s research methodology. Whether this represents a natural career extension of doctoral training, or a more structured transfer of institutional knowledge and relationships from Oxford/Janssen to a private company funded by the Altman network, is an open question.
Finding 4: The Dobyns Departure
Kit Dobyns, co-founder, left TrialSpark in 2019 to found Cayaba Care (maternal health). [1] This was the same year as: the 23andMe partnership (September), Somberg’s CMO appointment (November), and RTB-101’s Phase 3 failure (November). One co-founder left during the exact window when the company was building the infrastructure that would become Project Covalence.
Dobyns’s Rhodes Scholar focus was refugee and forced migration studies. His post-TrialSpark company focuses on maternal health equity. His trajectory suggests a values orientation toward vulnerable populations — which contrasts with the direction TrialSpark took through Project Covalence (testing a failed drug on nursing home residents) and Formation Bio (AI-driven drug acquisition for commercial licensing).
The founder whose academic focus was refugees and forced migration LEFT. The founder who came from Kushner’s health insurance company (Zhang, ex-Oscar Health) STAYED. The values divergence is documented through career choices, not assertions.
Finding 4b: The Zhang-Oscar-Kushner Pre-Founding Connection
Co-founder Linhao Zhang worked as a Product Engineer at Oscar Health (Josh Kushner’s health insurance company) before co-founding TrialSpark. This means the Kushner connection predates the Thrive Capital seed investment (September 2017) — Zhang was already in Kushner’s corporate orbit before TrialSpark existed. [1]
The personnel chain: Zhang at Oscar Health (Kushner) → Zhang co-founds TrialSpark → Thrive Capital (Kushner) invests seed round → Kareem Zaki (Thrive) joins TrialSpark board → Zaki sits on BOTH Oscar Health board AND TrialSpark board → employees flow between Oscar and TrialSpark. The Kushner connection isn’t an investment relationship that developed over time — it’s a founding-team relationship that the investment formalized.
Additionally, Formation Bio CFO James Leslie spent eleven years in the Restructuring and Reorganization group at Blackstone — the same PE firm where Zaki (Thrive Capital) spent three years before joining Thrive. Two Blackstone alumni in the same company’s operations and governance.
Finding 5: The Subsidiary Factory Under Liu’s Leadership
Under Liu’s CEO tenure, Formation Bio evolved from “clinical trial platform” to “pharmaceutical subsidiary factory”:
| Subsidiary | Drug | Source | Outcome |
|---|---|---|---|
| Libertas Bio (incorporated Dec 8, 2020) | Gusacitinib (JAK/SYK) | Asana BioSciences (Nov 2022) | Licensed to Sanofi €545M (Jun 2025) |
| Riverview Bio | Anti-CD226 antibody | IMIDomics (Jul 2025) | Ulcerative colitis development |
| High Line Bio | Sprifermin | Merck KGaA | Osteoarthritis development |
| Bleecker Bio | LNK01006 (TYK2) | Lynk Pharmaceuticals (Dec 2025) | CNS development |
The Libertas Bio subsidiary was incorporated December 8, 2020 — during Project Covalence’s active period, while the company was receiving Altman’s nonprofit grant. The pharmaceutical acquisition model was being designed simultaneously with the nonprofit-funded COVID platform.
Finding 6: Liu’s Narrative Control
Liu’s public narrative is carefully constructed: the brilliant Oxford student who saw pharma’s bottleneck and built a company to fix it. The founding story — “pharma companies turned me away not because of the science but because they couldn’t run trials” — appears in virtually every profile and press piece. [1][2][3][6][11]
What the narrative omits: the founding date discrepancy, the LabNook → social media classification, the ResearchWe/AlphaLab origin of the clinical trial recruitment engine, the $1M OpenResearch nonprofit grant, the Project Covalence outcomes (failed drug trial on nursing home residents, buried results), the Libertas Bio shell incorporated during COVID, and the Oxford circle that includes a military intelligence officer and a Trump AI policy advisor.
The public-facing story starts at Oxford and ends at Formation Bio. The documented story runs through Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Floor 10, a nonprofit grant, a pandemic platform, a nursing home in Rhode Island, and three trademarks including one filed from Mauritius.
Nodes / Open Questions
- What happened between 2014 (PA incorporation) and 2016 (Liu’s stated founding)? Was LabNook dormant for two years? Did it operate as a different product? Why does Crunchbase show the date being edited?
- What was Liu’s role in Project Covalence decision-making? He’s listed on the team page but Samantha Spear (a Client Growth Associate) claims on her Wharton resume that SHE “launched” it. What did Liu actually decide regarding the resTORbio collaboration, the nursing home trial, and the use of the OpenResearch grant?
- Did Liu interact with the resTORbio team (Mannick, Schor, Klickstein) through Novartis/NIBR connections? His advisor Lovestone went to J&J (Novartis competitor). Former Novartis CEO Jimenez is in his acknowledgments. The NIBR alumni reunion through Project Covalence ran through Liu’s company.
- What was Dobyns’s reason for leaving in 2019? Did the departure relate to the direction the company was taking? Dobyns’s subsequent focus on maternal health equity suggests different values than commercial drug acquisition.
- Does Liu have any personal investment in Retro Biosciences or other Altman portfolio companies? The autophagy pipeline runs from Project Covalence (RTB-101/mTOR) to Retro Bio (autophagy). Liu’s doctoral work on neurodegeneration overlaps with the same biological pathways.
- What is Liu’s relationship with the SVCF-funded Oxford network? Askonas (Oxford DPhil, now FAI/Trump AI policy) and Szablowski (US Army Intelligence, Oxford) were in the same cohort. SVCF funds both FAI and provided $30M (99.7% of revenue) to OpenAI nonprofit. Does Liu maintain relationships with the Oxford circle beyond Dobyns?
- The Lovestone → Janssen → Gorsky pipeline: Liu’s advisor went to J&J. J&J’s former CEO is in Liu’s investor network. Is there a commercial relationship between Formation Bio and Janssen/J&J? Any drug licensing deals? Clinical trial partnerships?
- Why is the TrialSpark Facebook page deleted? “This content isn’t available right now.” What content was on it and when was it removed?
- What is the full scope of Liu’s Harvard advisory role? Advisor to HBS MS/MBA Biotechnology program. Does this involve student recruitment, curriculum influence, or pipeline development? Does it connect to Fishman’s Harvard affiliations (HSCRB faculty)?
Sources
- [Archive] Contrary Research — “Formation Bio Business Breakdown & Founding Story”: https://research.contrary.com/company/formation-bio
- [Archive] Formation Bio — “About Us” page, Ben Liu bio: https://www.formation.bio/about-us
- [Archive] Equilar ExecAtlas — Benjamine Liu bio, Formation Bio: https://people.equilar.com/bio/org/formation-bio-inc/5746270
- [Archive] Cornell Chronicle — “Dobyns, Young named Rhodes scholars” (Nov 2012): https://news.cornell.edu/node/269657
- [Archive] Clay.earth — Benjamine Liu LinkedIn profile data: https://clay.earth/profile/benjamine-liu
- [Archive] Ben Liu — about.me page (Yale, TrialSpark description): https://about.me/benjamineliu
- [Archive] Janssen — Simon Lovestone bio (Global Head, Neuroscience Discovery): https://www.janssen.com/simon-lovestone-bsc-bm-phd
- [Archive] Wikipedia — Simon Lovestone (knighted 2017, Oxford, Janssen): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Lovestone
- [Archive] Crunchbase — Benjamine Liu (ChenPloktin Lab, ResearchWe): https://www.crunchbase.com/person/benjamine-liu
- [Archive] Clay.com — Benjamine Liu CEO dossier (ResearchWe, HBS advisor, co-founded Jan 2014): https://www.clay.com/dossier/formation-bio-ceo
- [Archive] Ben Liu — posthaven blog (rebrand announcement, founding thesis): https://benliu.posthaven.com/
- [Archive] Prior investigation sessions — SVCF → OpenAI $30M anonymous grant (FY2019) AND SVCF → Lincoln Network/FAI funding documented. Jon Askonas Oxford → FAI connection confirmed.
- [Archive] F6S — Evan Szablowski profile, BRTRS project, “Intelligence and Data Analysis Specialist, 2nd LT US Army”: https://www.f6s.com/member/evanszablowski
- [Archive] Dun & Bradstreet — LabNook Inc., 23 S 23rd St Unit H, Philadelphia PA 19103, classified “Media Streaming, Social Networks”: https://www.dnb.com/business-directory/company-profiles.labnook_inc.2027ca7dda1081de24f79e869134496e.html
- [Archive] SEC EDGAR — TrialSpark Inc CIK 0002028122, previous name LabNook Inc: https://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?company=trialspark&CIK=&type=&dateb=&owner=include&count=40&search_text=&action=getcompany
- [Archive] Innovation Works — AlphaLab lists TrialSpark/Formation Bio as one of two unicorns: https://www.innovationworks.org/about/news/alphalab-alphalab-gear-open-application-window-for-next-cohort-of-software-and-hardware-startups/
- [Archive] LinkedIn — Benjamine Liu investor/advisor acknowledgment post (Kushner, Fishman, Doerr, Hudson, Gorsky, Jimenez, Parikh, Altman): https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjamine-liu-54306518
- [Archive] Formation Bio Press — Mikael Dolsten (former Pfizer R&D Chief) joins Formation Bio (Apr 2025): https://www.formation.bio/press
This analysis does not constitute evidence of illegal action. The opinions expressed here are the professional opinions and analytical conclusions of the author, a published corporate ethics researcher and analyst specializing in business leadership ethics, governance structures, and nonprofit compliance. Readers are encouraged to examine the primary sources cited above and draw their own conclusions.
A conflict does not become less important because it was routed through a quieter entity. It becomes more important to map.
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