Kristina is a Santa Clara alum (’90) and a San Francisco Bay Area native.
Kristina has enjoyed a 27-year career in biotech startups. She credits her Santa Clara education for how far she has traveled into the business of scientific discovery. Kristina has led teams in finance and lab operations, from facility buildouts to large pharma M&A transactions. What she treasures the most, is that she was fortunate enough to learn from brilliant scientific minds in Silicon Valley.
Kristina was the first person in her family to attend a four-year university. Kristina’s mom immigrated from Quito, Ecuador, and her dad is a 2nd generation San Francisco Fireman. Kristina knows how important a LEAD program can be. At SCU in the late ‘80s, it was a meeting with the SCU Office of Chicano Affairs/Chicano Student Resources that transformed how she valued her college and later career experiences. Now she volunteers and writes screenplays full-time.