Derek K. Rapp

Derek joined RiverVest in 2019, bringing broad healthcare experience, along with strong entrepreneurial, deal-making, and strategic skills. In addition to being involved in RiverVest’s investment process, Derek works closely with the management team on strategy, operations, fundraising and investor relations. He also serves as liaison to the St. Louis region’s growing innovation system.

Prior to RiverVest, Derek served as president & CEO of JDRF, the world’s largest non-government funder of diabetes research and a major advocacy group for the type 1 diabetes community, and as CEO for life sciences start-up Divergence, Inc., which he led to a successful exit. He also served as Monsanto Company’s head of mergers and acquisitions, where he led transactions totaling more than $7 billion, and as the company’s director of investor relations. Derek began his career in mergers and acquisitions with Lazard Freres & Co. in New York.

Derek is a current member of the board of directors and the executive committee of Research!America, chairman of the board of directors of WeedOUT, and a member of the Global Mission Board of JDRF. He has served on numerous other boards, including chairing each of the Greater Saint Louis Community Foundation Board of Directors, the Plant and Life Sciences Working Group in St. Louis, and the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center Friends Board.

Derek earned an M.B.A. from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and an A.B. from Brown University.