The Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation has announced it will have a new managing director this summer following the retirement of current director Carl Gunderson.

Erik Iverson, a seven-year veteran of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, will assume the role of WARF director in July.

Iverson said his priority in July will be to take the time to truly get to know his new surroundings so that he can use his skills to best help the local community and the world.

“I want to spend some time getting to know the WARF team, the university, the Madison community and Wisconsin as a whole before determining specific goals for my time with WARF,” Iverson said.

Iverson spent the first ten years of his career in private legal practice, where he focused on licensing technology, entering into financing arrangements with small companies and acquiring and transferring technologies through licensing or mergers and acquisitions.

During his seven years working for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, he helped launch a venture fund that the foundation used to invest in new biotechnological and medical developments. At the foundation, Iverson said he developed a rich appreciation for WARF’s high quality work and integrity.

Today, Iverson runs the Infectious Disease Research Institute, a nonprofit global health research institute similar to Madison’s Morgridge Institute. The organization helps develop vaccines and drugs aimed at addressing diseases like malaria, tuberculosis, HIV and sleeping sickness.

Iverson said he is both excited and honored to be taking over as director of WARF.

“I’m excited for the opportunity to be engaged with such a tremendously well respected organization and such a world class research university as University of Wisconsin,” he said. “It is truly a world leader and I’m honored by the opportunity.”