About your speakers at BioBusiness 2012

James Sabry is Vice President, Genentech Partnering, where he oversees both the gRED Business Development and Alliance Management groups. These groups have been considered to be some of the best in the industry at sourcing, negotiating, closing and managing business development relationships across discovery research, technology acquisition and clinical development.

Sabry grew up in Toronto, Canada and received an M.D. from Queen’s University in Kingston, Canada after completing two years of undergraduate work in physics and chemistry. After completing an internship in internal medicine at Toronto Western Hospital, he moved to Harvard Medical School where he completed a residency in Neurology, being named chief resident in Neurology in 1987.

He then moved to San Francisco and, in 1994, completed a Ph.D. in Neuroscience in the Biochemistry Department at UCSF while also holding an adjunct clinical appointment in the Department of Neurology.

After completing post-doctoral work in the Biochemistry Department at Stanford Medical School, he spend 6 months as an entrepreneur-in-residence at Mayfield Fund in Menlo Park, CA. It was here that, in 1998, he founded and launched his first company, Cytokinetics, Inc.

James was President and CEO of Cytokinetics until 2007. During that time, he grew the company from inception to over 200 employees and took the company public on NASDAQ in 2004 in what was the second largest IPO of that year in the biotechnology industry. In 2007, he became Chairman of the Board of Directors and a formal member of their Scientific Advisory Board. The company currently has five small molecule programs in clinical development, all new chemical entities with novel mechanisms of action for the treatment of cancer, cardiovascular disease and neuromuscular disorders. During his tenure, Cytokinetics executed two large collaborative alliances, one with Glaxo SmithKline and one with Amgen.

In 2008, he became President and CEO of Arete Therapeutics, a company focused on the discovery and development of therapeutics for diabetes. He was also a member of the World Economic Forum’s Technology Pioneers from 2002-2005.

In 2010, Sabry moved to Genentech to take his current position. He maintains membership on the Scientific Advisory Board of Cytokinetics. He is also a member of the Board of Directors of a nonprofit organization, HopeLab that is working on advancing high tech solutions to certain diseases of youth and young adults. He is also on the external advisory board of QB3 at UCSF.

Onno van de Stolpe (CEO) founded Galapagos in 1999 and has grown the Company to its current level of about 800 employees. Galapagos is an integrated drug discovery company with a number of internal programs and two service divisions BioFocus and Argenta. For its internal programs, Galapagos has GSK, J&J, Roche and Servier as alliance partners. In these programs Galapagos is responsible for delivering clinical molecules after which the partner has certain licensing options. Before Galapagos, Onno established the European operations for Molecular Probes Inc. He started his professional career in 1987 as Manager Business Development at MOGEN, an agricultural biotech company. Onno received his Master’s degree in Virology, with honours, from the Agricultural University in Wageningen, the Netherlands.

Key challenge for 2012: Deliver on our objectives (revenue targets, profitability)
Why you are attending BioBusiness: Speaker on two panels
Who you hope to meet at the event: Existing and potential new partners

As Partner in SR One (GSK’s Corporate Venture Fund), David Phillips co-leads SR One in Europe’s investment activities as well as pioneering a new function to incubate and spin-out technologies from GSK. He brings a range of experience to SR One, including senior management roles in sales and marketing, commercial strategy and business development at Glaxo Wellcome, Cephalon, Medical Venture Management, The Automation Partnership and Galapagos.

David has significant deal making experience in the pharmaceutical and biotech sectors and has run a number of successful businesses deriving healthy exits for investors. David is based in London.

Sakae Asanuma, CFA, MBA: Managing Director Investment

• Bay Area based Venture Capitalist, focusing on US biotech investment since 2000
• Invested in 20+ US life science start-ups, achieving 4 IPOs and 8 M&As to date
• Joined Astellas Venture Management (AVM) in June 2011
• Prior to AVM, Director at Yasuda Enterprise Development America (Japan’s major VC firm with $800M under management) from 2000 to 2011, originating all of the US biotech investment activities for Yasuda and supporting business development discussions with Japanese pharmaceutical companies on behalf of his portfolios
• Prior to Yasuda, Venture Capitalist and Buy-side Equity Analyst in Japan at Meiji-Yasuda Life Insurance Company from 1988 to 1999, managing its $20B equity portfolios
• Holder of a Master of Business Administration from Carnegie Mellon University
  

Dr Werner Lanthaler was appointed Chief Executive Officer of Evotec in March 2009. From March 2000 to March 2009 he was Chief Financial Officer at Intercell AG. During his tenure, Intercell developed from a venture-backed biotechnology company into a global vaccine player. Dr Lanthaler played a pivotal role in many of the company's major corporate milestones including the product approval of Intercell's Japanese Encephalitis Vaccine, the company's acquisitions and strategic pharma partnerships, as well as the company's Initial Public Offering in 2005.

Previously, from 1998 to 2000 Dr Lanthaler served as Director of the Federation of Austrian Industry, and from 1995 to 1998 as Senior Management Consultant at the consulting firm McKinsey & Company. He holds a doctorate in economics from Vienna University, earned his Master's degrees from Harvard University, and holds a degree in Psychology.

Deborah joined SR One in 2005 to establish the firm’s European investment office.

She brings to SR One extensive operational, drug development and licensing experience gained through numerous roles held in clinical development, medical affairs and business development during her more than 20 year tenure in the pharmaceutical industry. Deborah is currently a member of the Board of Directors of Mission Therapeutics Limited, Protaffin AG, Bicycle Therapeutics Limited, Syntaxin Limited, and f-star GmbH and is an observer on the board of 7TM Pharma. She was previously a member of the Board of Directors of Addex Pharmaceuticals (IPO, SIX Swiss Exchange, 2007) and Pharmakodex Limited (sold to Orexo) and an observer on the Board of Ablynx (IPO, Euronext Brussels 2007).

Deborah received her BSc. (Hons.) in Pharmacology from the University of Bath, her PhD in Pharmacology from the University of London, and her MBA from Henley Management College.

Carole Nuechterlein has headed the Roche Venture Fund since 2001. Prior to her current position, she worked in the pharmaceutical/biotech as an attorney for ten years. She joined Roche from SangStat in Fremont California where she was General Counsel. Carole began her career working at Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom in the M&A group. From there, she worked at Syntex/Roche in Palo Alto, California focusing on M&A, research collaborations and licensing deals. Due to her background in M&A, Carole led the negotiation team for the Roche acquisitions of GlycArt and Therapeutic Human Polyclonals. She currently serves as a board observer at Aileron, Alios, Ambit, Ambrx, Conatus, Envoy, Idaho Technology and Nereus. She has a BA from Valparaiso University and a JD from University of Michigan.

Challenge for 2012: Exits and finding the diamonds in the rough.

Dr Melanie Lee Ph.D. CBE, FMedSci. D.Sc (Hons) Melanie’s academic grounding in molecular genetics in three complex systems of DNA repair and recombination, RNA splicing and cell cycle was a broad and an important foundation for her future career. Melanie was cited by Sir Paul Nurse in his inaugural ceremony in Stockholm on receipt of his Nobel Prize for Medicine in 2001 for her contribution to his cell cycle work. Melanie’s industrial career has been through Glaxo, GlaxoWellcome, Celltech and UCB. During her career leading the discovery organization as well as Research & Development, for 6 years as a Board Director with Celltech plc and 5 years on the Executive Committee of UCB, Melanie has led R&D through 6 integrations. In 2008 she put in place the foundations of an innovative organization named UCB NewMedicines which is accountable from Discovery through to Proof of Concept for small and large molecule drugs. Melanie joined the Board of BTG plc in November 2010. Melanie was the Chair of Cancer Research Technology and on the Board of CRT for 10 years until September 2011 and she was a Trustee and Deputy-Chair of Cancer Research UK for 6 years. Melanie was honoured in 2008 with a CBE for services to Medical Science.

Melanie believes that the pharmaceutical industry is undergoing a complete change of mindset and skills base as well as way of working which enhances the importance of biotech companies for the future of the new drug Research & Development. She believes that the importance of academia and industry (large & small) working together is crucial to innovation and advancing science and human health. Melanie is currently CEO of Syntaxin Ltd which she joined in February 2010.

Key challenge for 2012: Develop Syntaxin further as a company through its pipeline and to open the eyes of large pharma companies to the potential of our technology as platform for therapeutics to treat a board range of human diseases. There is much precedent now for the use of botulinum toxin as a therapeutic entity so it should be a small intellectual step for companies to see the potential of targeted secretion inhibitors.

Why you are attending BioBusiness: BioBusiness is in London where I hope to meet with representatives of large and small pharma, biotech and venture partners who are concerned about enriching the UK bioscience sector.

Who you hope to meet at the event: I hope to meet people who have a strong understanding of creative environments and how to foster innovative work in small companies. I don’t want to meet those who are fixated in a controlling mindset and who don’t understand the nature of real collaboration.

Andrew P Sandham, BSc DipM, Chairman & Chief Executive Officer, Kymab. Mr Sandham has 30 years experience in business development and marketing within the healthcare sector. He has played a key role in building successful businesses in pharmaceutical discovery and development in Europe and the USA, serving as a founder and executive of Cantab Pharmaceuticals, Hexagen, Signature BioScience, Ionix Pharmaceuticals and Kymab. Mr Sandham is current also non-executive chairman of Bicycle Therapeutics and a non-executive director of NeurAxon and Plant Bioscience Ltd. He has also served as non-executive chairman of Syntaxin and Novacta Biosystems, non-executive director of Synosia and was a venture partner with Abingworth LLP. Mr Sandham holds a BSc in chemistry from UEA, Norwich and a Diploma in Marketing from the Chartered Institute of Marketing, UK.

Key challenge for 2012: Steering the transition of Kymab, a human antibody platform company, from technology development to drug discovery through target selection and partnering.

Why you are attending BioBusiness: Networking with pharma/biotech companies for future partnering and updating investors for when we raise Series B in 2-3 years time.

Who you hope to meet at the event: Pharmas, Biotechs, Investors

Jørgen started his first companies in the early 80s before he was headhunted twice to corporate management positions in the pharmaceutical industry (Pharmacia and Aventis) from 1990 to 1997, being responsible for billion dollar product brands and the establishment and merger of companies. In this period he gained hands on experience in hospital, specialist, GP, OTC and consumer product development, sales & marketing as well as corporate branding. The vision for building own products and businesses drove him to become founder and director of BioGaia HealthCare Sweden in 1997. A range of products based on his inventions was developed and several corporate deals were signed (representing a turnover of EUR 15 million today). In 2001 Jørgen was headhunted to Novozymes as Vice President Business Development to repeat what he did for BioGaia and create new business as a second leg to the enzymes business. Through a series of M&A transactions and innovations, this was accomplished in 2007 with a business approaching 150 million Euro.

Jørgen Thorball has a track record as co-founder and chairman of a range of Biotech, Medtech and IT companies, amongst them Pergamum, ViroGates, YourGlobalEye, Vivostat, Alsensa, Lina-Medical, iMotions and MYC4.com. He is also the inventor of several medical applications, including the first internet-SMS based patient alert system (1996), various clinical delivery systems (1995, 1999, 2001, 2003) and biomaterial patents (2005, 2006). He is on the board of BioGaia and GazelleGrowth, the latter assisting Danish SMEs entering the US market. In 2003 he co-founded www.BiotechBuilders.com. In 2006 he co-authored two books on innovation and is today frequent speaker at seminars as well as Executive MBA courses.

Key challenge for 2012: To expand XOventure, engaging the best experts to allow for global reach in our quest to build better life science companies and products
Why you are attending BioBusiness: As speaker I hope to inspire entrepreneurs, industry leaders and investors to work more efficiently together to increase productivity and returns
Who you hope to meet at the event: Talented leaders and investors

Dr. Axel Polack joined TVM Capital in 2000, and is a General Partner for life sciences at TVM Capital GmbH, Munich, which manages Fund generations III to VI. He is a member of the Board of Directors of Noxxon Pharma AG (Berlin, Germany), Invendo Medical (Kissing, Germany, f-star (Vienna, Austria) and Probiodrug AG (Halle, Germany). Dr. Polack’s main scientific fields of expertise are molecular and viral oncology, oncogene activation, gene regulation and molecular immunology. He works intensively on the assessment of new investment opportunities in those areas, while also providing support to existing portfolio companies.

Before joining TVM Capital, Dr. Polack was General Manager of Innovative Technologies Neuherberg GmbH (ITN – now known as Ascenion). Ascenion acts as a marketing partner to research institutions of the Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft, for example, GSF – National Research Center for Environment and Health GmbH, which licenses patents and fosters start-up companies. In the eight years prior to Ascenion, Dr. Polack was the deputy head of the GSF – Institute of Clinical Molecular Biology. He holds a doctorate summa cum laude in medicine from the University of Freiburg and a Second Thesis (postdoctoral lecture qualification “Habilitation”) in the field of virology. Dr. Polack is also a member of the board of the German Vaccine Research Foundation (Hanover).

Dr. Polack’s doctoral thesis was honored with the Goedecke Research prize for outstanding fundamental research in medicine. In 1995 he was appointed assistant professor/private lecturer (“PD”) by the Ludwig-Maximilian-University in Munich. Since 1984 he has co-authored more than 50 publications in peer review journals.

Denise is the Managing Partner at Phase4 Ventures, a London-based venture capital firm that invests in Life Sciences in the US and Europe. She has over 14 years experience as a venture capitalist and was a Managing Director at Nomura prior to Phase4’s spin-out which was backed by Harbourvest. She is currently a Director of Albireo, Nabriva (Chaiman), Oncomed and Idenix. She was previously an investment manager in the Bioscience Unit of Rothschild Asset Management, and held senior management positions in R&D and strategic consulting. She holds a PhD and a BSc (Hons) from Birmingham University and was a Fulbright Scholar at the University of California, Berkeley. Denise is a member of the Board of Trustees and Council of the British Heart Foundation. She received the “Women in the City” award for Financial Services in 2008.

Key challenge for 2012: The Life Sciences Venture Capital sector is undergoing significant change and fund raising for GP’s in 2012 remains a key challenge. Smaller funds are now the norm and this has a knock-on effect in terms of financing the companies themselves and their business plans especially in Europe. We need to convince investors in the funds that the asset class will generate strong returns. The arguments will need to be compelling against the backdrop of increasing regulatory and reimbursement hurdles faced by the traditional acquirers of the companies and the continuing lack of public market investors for these types of companies.

Why you are attending BioBusiness: These events bring together the all the parties involved in financing, operating, partnering and acquiring life science companies under one roof. They promote real interaction on a wide range of topics from the key challenges we are facing as an industry to innovative business models. The panel debates promote interaction between the audience and speakers and show how others are approaching these issues, some successfully.

Who you hope to meet at the event: I will be hoping to meet some of the senior executives from pharma and large biotech companies (and hear what development stage assets they are currently looking for), some potential investee companies and my fellow venture capitalists to share their views.

Francesco de Rubertis is the General Partner of Index Ventures and is responsible for the firm's life sciences practice as well as Index's networks within the scientific community. His areas of expertise include biotechnology and biopharmaceuticals. He joined Index in 1998 and has served on the board of several companies including Addex, Genmab, Bioxell, ParAllelle Bioscience and 7TM. Prior to joining Index, Francesco was involved in post-doctoral research in genetics at the Whitehead Institute, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He is also the author of several publications in international scientific journals including Nature. Francesco has a BA in Genetics and Microbiology from the University of Pavia, Italy and a PhD in Molecular Biology from the University of Geneva, Switzerland. He is also a CFA charter holder.

Kimberly Brue joined Biogen Idec as Senior Director, Alliance Management, within Program Leadership and Management. In this role, she is responsible for the Tysabri collaboration, managing interactions with Elan including all joint governance committees. Additionally, she will be working within the organization in order to create a consistent alliance approach with the goal of maximizing organizational capability in how Biogen manages alliances. Kimberly has previously worked at sanofi-aventis and sanofi-pasteur (Vaccine Division) in various positions since 2001, primarily in Alliance Management where she was Head of the US Alliance Management group within the Prospective and Strategic Initiatives Department of R&D. Her group managed complex alliances that crossed over multiple sanofi-aventis divisions and therapeutic areas, including the antibody discovery agreement with Regeneron. Prior to sanofi, Kimberly worked at Cell & Molecular Technologies as a Project Leader, primarily managing their largest contract with Merck Pharmaceuticals for high throughput cell-based screening. Kimberly is a member of ASAP (the Association for Strategic Alliance Professionals), is Co-Chair of ASAP’s Bio Pharma Council, and holds two certifications in Alliance Management. She also holds a BS in Molecular Biology from Pennsylvania State University, a MS in Molecular Biology from Georgian Court University, and a Pharmaceutical MBA from Drexel University

Key challenge for 2012: Working within a dynamic alliance that involves commercial product and development phases of the lifecycle.

Why you are attending BioBusiness: To network with other professionals involved in alliances and learn & share industry best practices.

Who you hope to meet at the event: Alliance Management / Business Development professionals who are interested in discussing alliance practices.

Nicholas Adams, Chief Business Officer at Clavis Pharma, has more than 23 years of experience in the healthcare industry. For the past 12 years, he worked for the UK-quoted cancer company Antisoma plc, the majority of which as Vice President Business Development and a member of the senior management team. During his time at Antisoma, he gained experience across a range of international deal types (including in- and out-licensing, divestments, royalty buy-outs and M&A).Prior to this, Mr Adams spent eleven years in various positions at Ciba-Geigy (now Novartis), Eisai and Covance. He has a degree in biology from the University of Hertfordshire and postgraduate qualifications in law from the College of Law in London.

Mr Dimitriou, has over 20 years’ experience in the pharmaceutical and biotech industry. His past roles include Senior Director, Worldwide Business Development at GlaxoSmithKline, where his responsibilities included worldwide corporate deals with pharmaceutical and biotech companies. He held a similar role in Europe for Bristol-Myers Squibb. He is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of DyoDelta Biosciences Ltd, a company specialising in transactions between pharma and biotech companies and was Chief Executive Officer of the London-based drug discovery company, Xcellsyz Ltd. He has a degree in biochemistry from the University of London (Kings College) and an MSc in pathology and toxicology from the Imperial College Medical School of the University of London.

Dr Carl Firth is Founder and CEO of ASLAN Pharmaceuticals, an Asia enabled pharmaceutical company that develops novel medicines for global markets. Previously, he was Head of Asia Healthcare at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, supporting public and private financing of healthcare companies across the region and advising on M&A transactions. Prior to joining the banking industry, he worked for AstraZeneca for nearly 10 years. In 2007, he was the Regional Business Development Director, AsiaPac, and a member of the regional management team. From 2004-6, Carl led new product development and business development in AstraZeneca China, based in Shanghai, where he was responsible for the development of new products for the China market and local inlicensing activities.

Carl has held positions in other commercial areas in the UK, including acquisitions, licensing and competitive intelligence, and has over 5 years of pharmaceutical R&D experience.
Carl is an advisor to the Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology Innovation Centre and several life science companies in Asia. He is a regular speaker and chair at international conferences.
Carl holds a PhD from Cambridge University in Molecular Biology (Trinity College), an Executive MBA from London Business School and a degree in Molecular Biology from Cambridge University.

Key challenges for 2012: Finding high quality ealry clinical onco, resp, infl compounds from big pharma / biotech that we can develop in Asia. Continuing with our successful fundraising activities to raise capital to build our portfolio

Why you are attending BioBusiness: To increase the presence and visibility of ASLAN & connect with investors

Who you hope to meet at the event:Investors, Pharma/biotech with early clinical compounds looking for partners

George Yeh joined TLC in 2002 as President. He leads TLC’s operations, responsible for strategic planning, business development, product licensing, and management of corporate funding. In a relatively short period of time, he grew TLC into one of the fastest‐growing drug delivery companies in Asia. In 2006, TLC was named top 100 private companies by Red Herring Asia, and shortlisted for Red Herring Global in 2007. George also received the “Outstanding Young Innovator Award” in 2008 for his contribution to the biotechnology industry in Taiwan. George was most recently CFO of Hermes Biosciences, assisting to structure and negotiate technology transfer and license contracts with pharmaceutical companies. Prior to joining Hermes, George was Vice President of AsiaWired Group where he was responsible for procuring corporate funding, strategic planning, and integration of high‐level management and financial resources for start‐ups. At AsiaWired Group, George successfully assisted Presenter, Calimetrics and other high tech companies with fundraising of over $40M and planned Asian expansion for several US‐based companies. Before coming to AsiaWired Group, George was an associate at General Bank, evaluating start‐ups and venture capital partnership for debt financing. George holds a B.A. from the University of California at Berkeley, and a M.A. and a M.B.A. from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor.

Key challenge for 2012: The effect of healthcare reform on the drug prices and the subsequent drug shortage is likely to continue affect the pharma industry in 2012, combined with the expiration of patents on branded drugs, the industry landscape would surely be undergoing significant changes. How biotech companies and pharmas collaborate to best accommodate and adapt to the change will be, in my mind, the key challenge for all in 2012.

Why you are attending BioBusiness: It would be an excellent opportunity for networking and bouncing ideas off fellow biotech companies and pharmas to further develop TLC for the international arena.

Who you hope to meet at the event: I would be interested in meeting all types of guests who’ll be joining the event, namely, pharma, biotech and VC. In particular, I would like to meet with people who are responsible for the in-licensing of products and technologies for business development purpose.

Dr Lee is currently a Senior Fellow with the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR), Singapore. He is also a Professor in Orthopaedic Surgery at the National University of Singapore, Emeritus Consultant at the National University Hospital and Senior Consultant at the KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital. He was the former Executive Director of the Biomedical Research Council, A*STAR and a past Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, National University of Singapore.

Dr Lee received his medical and postgraduate medical training in Canada and specializes in Paediatric Orthopaedics. His research interest is in stem cells and musculoskeletal tissue engineering and he currently leads a team of researchers at the NUS Tissue Engineering Program.

He is a member of the editorial boards of several international refereed journals in orthopaedic surgery and basic research and reviews regularly for high impact journals in orthopaedics, stem cells and tissue engineering.

He has over 150 publications in refereed journals and over 300 conference papers. He has co-authored a book with Ariff Bongso entitled “Stem Cells: from Bench to Bedside” which is in its second edition, and has been adopted by many centres internationally as a standard text for stem cell courses.

Steven H. Holtzman joined Biogen Idec (NASDAQ: BIIB) in early 2011 as its Executive Vice President, Corporate Development in which capacity he is responsible for Corporate Strategy and M&A, Business Development, and Program Leadership & Management.

From 2001-2010, Steve served as a Founder, the CEO and Chair of the Board of Directors of Infinity Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: INFI), a small molecule cancer drug discovery and development company. He continues to serve as Chair of the Board of Infinity. From 1994 – 2001, Steve was an early leader and the Chief Business Officer of Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: MLNM; now a subsidiary of Takeda Pharmaceuticals), a pioneer in the development and application of modern genetic and genomic technologies to discover new drugs. In this role, at various times he was responsible for all of the non-R&D functions of the company. From 1986-1994, Steve was a Founder, a member of the Board, and the Executive Vice President of DNX Corporation (NASDAQ: DNXX), the first commercial enterprise devoted to the development of agricultural, biomedical, and pharmaceutical applications of transgenic (genetically engineered) animal technology.

Steve is a Board Member of the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) and a Trustee of the Berklee College of Music. From 1996 to 2001, Mr. Holtzman served as presidential appointee to the National Bioethics Advisory Commission. Steve received his B.A. in Philosophy (1976) from Michigan State University and his B.Phil. graduate degree in Philosophy (1979) from Corpus Christi College, Oxford University, which he attended as a Rhodes Scholar.

Peter Nolan was appointed to Oxford BioMedica's board in May 2002, having been a senior member of the Company since its foundation. He is also a Director of the UK BioIndustry Association and is a past chairman of the Oxfordshire Bioscience Network. He has broad experience and knowledge of the biotechnology sector.

Prior to joining Oxford BioMedica, he served as head of the Biotechnology Unit at the UK Department of Trade & Industry for eight years. In that role he was responsible for establishing and managing complex collaborative research programmes involving industry, research councils and other government departments.

Previously he held senior positions in the Laboratory of the Government Chemist and also the Metropolitan Police Laboratory in London where he was a senior forensic scientist.

Nicki Thompson joined GSK’s Centres of Excellence for Drug Discovery (CEDD) in 2010 as Director, Scientific Opportunities. Prior to joining the CEEDD, Dr. Thompson was Head of Discovery at Syntaxin (a U.K. based Biotech company), responsible for delivery of novel biopharmaceuticals in the areas of neurological, inflammatory and endocrine diseases through to Development. Dr. Thompson joined Syntaxin from GSK, where she worked in a variety of drug discovery roles with increasing responsibility from target identification through to candidate selection over a 20 year period.

At GSK, Dr. Thompson was based in the Respiratory CEDD, where as head of the Allergic Mechanisms group, she lead a number of drug discovery programs and external alliances, focussing on allergic and inflammatory processes.

Dr. Thompson obtained a BSc in Applied Biology and a Ph.D. in Cell Biology (Laboratory for Molecular Cell Biology, University of London) and has co-authored several peer-reviewed publications and patent applications.

Gertjan Bartlema, of Dutch and Swiss nationality, has been Executive Director Marketing & Sales Excellence for Celgene EMEA since March 2011. Previously he was a member of the Business Development team, based in Summit, NJ, that acquired Gloucester Pharmaceuticals Inc. and Abraxis BioScience Inc.

Mr. Bartlema started with Celgene in May 2006 in Business Planning EMEA. Prior to joining Celgene, Mr. Bartlema started his career in Biotech in 1997 at Amgen Europe and became a member of the Amgen Corporate Financial Planning & Analysis group in 1999.

Mr. Bartlema holds a master in Economics from Maastricht University, The Netherlands.

Graeme Martin is President and CEO of Takeda Ventures, Inc (TVI), the corporate venture arm of Takeda Pharmaceutical Company, Ltd. TVI encourages and supports therapeutic innovation in biopharmaceutical companies and academic centers of excellence through early stage capital investment and provision of access to the resources of a multinational pharmaceutical company. Since joining TVI in 2003, Dr Martin has built a portfolio of strategic investments representing $52MM under management.

During more than 30 years in large Pharma and small Biotech pharmaceutical R&D, Dr Martin has been responsible for three IND submissions and is an inventor of Zomig®, now marketed worldwide for the acute treatment of migraine. He received his Bachelor of Science degree in Pharmacology from the University of Bath, UK and his doctorate from University College, London, UK.

Key challenge for 2012: Anticipating and successfully responding to the rapidly evolving venture environment affecting the Pharma industry

With over 14 years of Pharma R&D experience, Michael previously led a computational biology team at GlaxoSmithKline focused on genetics and neuroscience drug discovery. Michael has championed pre-competitive collaboration between pharma, recently he co-led an EFPIA team to gain €10M Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI) funding for the OpenPhacts project, which will build an open suite of bio- and cheminformatics resources for drug discovery.

After leaving GSK, he collaborated with Dr Jackie Hunter, CBE, to co-found OI Pharma Partners Ltd, a consultancy using open innovation as a tool to stimulate R&D in the pharma and healthcare sectors (www.oipharma.com). Michael is passionate about using Open Innovation as a tool to improve the translational and collaborative interface between industry and academia and was recently appointed Director of Bioinformatics at the William Harvey Research Institute, Queen Mary University of London.

Dr. Owen Wallace is Site Scientific Leader, Lilly Research Center, UK. He received his B.Sc. (Hons) degree in Chemistry from University College, Cork, Ireland in 1991. He then moved to Yale University in the United States where he obtained his Ph.D. in Synthetic Organic Chemistry in 1995 with Prof. Frederick E. Ziegler.

Dr. Wallace then joined the Bristol-Myers Squibb Pharmaceutical Research Institute in Wallingford, CT as a Research Investigator. He initially contributed to projects directed towards Alzheimer's disease before transitioning to the infectious disease area where he worked on new approaches to treating HIV infection. During this period, Dr. Wallace contributed to the discovery of several drug candidates.

In 2000, he moved to Eli Lilly & Company and began to work in the area of endocrinology, initially on projects targeting women's health disorders (uterine fibroids and hot flushes). He then transitioned to research in the metabolic disorders field where he led a project for type 2 diabetes. He has been named as a co-inventor of seven clinical candidates and has been a scientific team leader on projects that have delivered four candidates.

In 2003, Dr. Wallace was promoted to Head, Lead Optimisation, Discovery Chemistry Research and Technologies, and was promoted to Senior Director, Neuroscience and Obesity Chemistry in 2005 with responsibilities for medicinal chemistry on projects for Alzheimer's disease, depression, schizophrenia, pain and obesity.

In 2010, he transferred to the UK to become Site Scientific Leader of the Surrey-based Lilly Research Centre where he is accountable for the discovery of drug candidates targeting Neuroscience indications. He has direct responsibility for the Chemistry organisation, in addition to the bioanalytical group and new target enablement biology group. He has championed an in-sourcing initiative that has increased the size of the group by ~50%, and is a member of the steering committees for multiple collaborations responsible for the discovery and clinical development of compounds for CNS disorders and diabetes

Dr. Wallace is a co-author/inventor on numerous peer reviewed publications and patents.

Martino is the first CEO of the Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst. With a PhD in Biochemistry, Martino has more than 20 years’ experience in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology sector and is a board member of UKBI. Martino joined Amersham International in 1991 and subsequently went on to manage the R&D Technology Transfer Group, based in Cardiff, developing high throughput screening technologies for the pharmaceutical sector. Following the merger of Amersham with Pharmacia Biotech, Martino became the Science Director for the Cardiff site, looking to acquire and develop next generation technologies for the company. More recently, Martino was Managing Director of the University of Manchester Incubator Company (UMIC), a company set up by the university to manage all incubation facilities. In this role, Martino oversaw its development into a venture that housed in excess of 80 small and medium enterprises and startup companies, generating more than 1000 jobs in the process. In addition to his role as CEO for Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst, Martino is also acting Chairman for a start-up company, SRi Forensics Ltd and has previously been on the Board of Cartesian Technologies. Martino was (until recently) also a non executive Director for Queen Mary Bioenterprise Ltd.

Key challanges for 2012: To ensure we have our facility up and running on time and to budget, with some quality “Phase 1” tenants identified and ready to help shape the future of the Park. SBC wishes to continue developing the Open Innovation agenda which is a key vision for the Park. We hope to attract investors of all types and to build a network of associates that can provide a cost effective range of services for our tenants. We aim to become a National strategic player within the UK biotech community with a new type of cluster developing that is complementary to those around us and within the UK. 

Why you are attending BioBusiness: This is an important meeting and strategic “game-changers” will be attending. SBC will need to be present to help deliver its goals and objectives for the coming year. 

Who you hope to meet at the event:Strategic thinkers, potential tenants, investors and other members of the Biotech community. SBC will also be seeking International partners who share in our vision.

Alan and his team are accountable for delivering the enabling activities which facilitate the discovery and development of new medicines at GlaxoSmithKline. As part of that role, he has a particular interest in developing external partnerships with Academia, PPPs and Biotech/Pharma. This includes models of open innovation where by being more open, i.e. by giving up more and sharing more, we will create the right environment to stimulate innovation and enhance the productivity of R&D and deliver products of value.

Key challanges for 2012: To further develop the opportunities and business structures which will enhance our ability to discover and develop medicines within a Pharma / Biotech / Academia ecosystem.

Why you are attending BioBusiness: To learn more about the challenges and opportunities that the sector faces.

Who you hope to meet at the event: Biotech, Academia and Funding experts.

Meeta Chatterjee is Head, Global Out-Licensing, Word Wide Licensing at Merck Research Labs.

Meeta Chatterjee received her undergraduate education at St. Xavier’s University in Ahmedabad, India and Rutgers University in New Jersey (BA, Hons Physics). She received a PhD in Physiology from the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey-Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences. She completed her postdoctoral training in the Department of Physiology at the University of Virginia School of Medicine where her research focused on the regulation of smooth muscle contraction.

Meeta joined the Cardiovascular Discovery Research group at Schering Plough in 1984 and, as head of the Vascular Biology group, led research efforts in the areas of cardiovascular disease, atherosclerosis and obesity. She joined the R&D Licensing group within Schering Plough Research Institute in 1996. Her role in licensing was to provide oversight for world-wide due diligence activities for in-licensing, out-licensing and acquisition efforts at SP. Following the acquisition of Schering-Plough by Merck, Meeta joined Merck Research as Head of Global-Out Licensing and Asset Management in World Wide Licensing. In this new role, she has responsibility for the strategic and tactical oversight of all aspects of Merck Research Labs out-licensing and asset management activities. She will expand Merck’s business model to include the out-licensing of development compounds/programs, technologies, devices, and formulations to targeted partner organizations.

Bill Dawson retired from Eli Lilly and Co in 1996 after 27 years service and established Bionet Ltd as a health care consultancy working at the interface between academia and industry. At Lilly, Bill was Research Director for 14 years and took 15 compounds into development, two of which reached the market. Latterly, he was Director of Technology Acquisition, Europe, for Lilly.

He continues to be a member of the ABPI Academic Liaison Working Group. He is Director of the University of Manchester Medicines Network. He is a non-executive director of Proteome Sciences plc, Antitope Ltd, Pharmovation Ltd and a member of a number of corporate Scientific Advisory Boards. Previously, he was a Director of Biovation Ltd, purchased by Merck KGaA, Enzacta Ltd, merged to form Enact Pharma Ltd and now part of Protherics plc and the Babraham Institute where he served the maximum two terms.

Professor Dawson qualified as a pharmacist and specialised in pharmacology. His research interests are in immunopharmacology and in the rational design, selection and progression of new medicines through optimal research and development programmes.

Malcolm has a BSc and PhD in biochemistry and biophysics from Imperial College, London. He was Head of the Biomolecular Structure Department and then the Molecular Sciences Division of GlaxoWellcome with responsibility for 300 people engaged in target validation and lead discovery. During this time he led the application of structural biology and modelling to drug discovery, resulting in the advancement of clinical candidates to a wide range of diseases.

He joined the structural bioinformatics and drug discovery company Inpharmatica Ltd as CEO in 2000, growing it from the spin-out stage to a 100-person company. Inpharmatica was sold to Galapagos NV in 2006.

He joined MRC Technology in 2006 in order to establish Heptares Therapeutics Ltd in July 2007, as co-Founder and CEO.

Malcolm was elected Visiting Professor of Biochemistry at Imperial College, London in 1997 and is on the Chemistry and Chemical Biology Advisory Boards at the same university. He served on the Council of the UK Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council from 2004 - 2011.

Key challenges for 2012: Build on early pipeline and partnering success.

Dirk Reyn is managing director of Shire-Movetis NV and has worked in the industry for 23 years.

Following 10 years in a number of sales and marketing functions with Eli Lilly in Belgium, USA and France, Dirk joined Johnson & Johnson in 1992. After different roles with increasing responsibility, he led the International Marketing department for the Gastrointestinal Franchise and was the driving force behind the global marketing and commercial strategy for different GI products between 1992 and 1999. He was selected to create the first Johnson & Johnson CRM (Customer Relationship Management) Competence Centre (2001-2002) and then became Vice President New Business Development for Janssen-Cilag in Europe (2002- 2006). Together with three other founders, he started Movetis in December 2006. October 2010 Movetis was acquired by Shire. Shire-Movetis NV in Turnhout is to become the GI R&D and EU Commercial Centre of Excellence for Shire.

Simon joined Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH as Corporate Senior Vice President Biopharmaceuticals on January 3rd, 2011. Having graduated with a Bachelor of Science from the University of Sussex in the UK, Simon entered industry almost 30 years ago in 1981. He initially joined Napp Laboratories, the UK subsidiary of a global U.S.-based pharmaceutical company and initially followed a standard marketing and sales oriented career. In 1985 he joined the growing Astra Pharmaceuticals, which was about to launch Omeprazole, the GI Blockbuster. In 1987 he joined the biotech world. Simon entered Celltech and concecutively grew his career in parallel to the growth and diversification of the company itself. After initial roles in business development, he became responsible for the commercial part of Celltech Biologics, the contract manufacturing division of Celltech. He finally held the CEO post of Celltech Biologics. Simon drove the divestment of the company to Lonza and integrated Celltech Biologics into the new owner.

In 1997 he founded RiboTargets and successfully grew the company over the next 10 years to a point where it had two products on the market and a small, but healthy R&D pipeline. In 2007 Simon served as a Member of the Executive Board at OctoPlus, a Dutch based Biotech company and took the responsibility as a CEO in 2008 at a time when the company was in financial difficulty. Over the last two years, he has successfully turned around OctoPlus, refocused the company on the contract manufacturing business and established it on the path to profitability.

Hervé is Vice President of Global Market Access and Pricing at Brussels based biopharmaceutical company UCB. He is responsible for strengthening and consolidating a cross functional team of health economics, patient-reported outcomes, epidemiology, market access and pricing professionals. His team is leading on the development and the implementation of market access propositions, value stories and pricing strategies in support of all major UCB marketed and portfolio compounds in the fields of neurology and immunology.

Prior to this role, Hervé was Outcomes Research Therapy Area Director with Pfizer where he has piloted a new model for European brand market access support. He has also served as Managing Director of Paris based consultancy firm CLP-Santé (now part of IMS Consulting). A former adjunct Professor of Health Economics at Paris-Dauphine University, he has authored numerous publications and book chapters and has discussed the topic in various conferences.

Hervé holds of a BSc in Statistics and an MSc in Health Economics both from Paris-Dauphine University.

Denise Goode, BSc ACA, joined AstraZeneca in 1994 and has been dealmaking for over 10 years.

After graduating in biological sciences and qualifying as a Chartered Accountant in the UK, Denise’s Pharmaceutical career started in finance with PwC and then with AstraZeneca. Denise has worked all over the World on all aspects of strategic reviews, finance, global and local product transactions. She is currently Executive Regional and Corporate Business Development Director in AstraZeneca’s Strategic Partnering and Business Development team. Her successes include leadership & delivery of the AZ/BMS collaboration for saxagliptin & dapagliflozin and a subsequent related Japanese deal; in-licenses of Vimovo & AZD-1067; the in-license of Crestor and associated Japanese co-marketing arrangements with Shionogi; the divestment of the global Dental business; & the original 2004 C.A.T. alliance. She has also worked on many academic alliances with major Universities around the World and on many R&D collaborations. She is engaged on transactions in Emerging Markets, and on the recently signed Real World Evidence alliance with IMS supporting AstraZeneca’s leading position in relation to Payer Evidence.

Ian Nicholson joined Chroma in September 2004. Prior to joining Chroma, he was Senior Vice President of Business Development for Celltech, responsible for all global licensing activities, and additionally held the position of Acting CEO, Oxford GlycoSciences following its acquisition by Celltech.

Prior to this he was Commercial Director at Oxford Asymmetry and has held a variety of senior commercial positions with Lonza and Amersham.

He holds a BSc (Hons) degree from University College, London and an MBA from Boston University.

David Colpman is a senior member of Shire’s business development team focused on building the global speciality business through licensing and M&A.

During the last eleven years at Shire, David has completed around 10 licensing deals. In addition he has run numerous M&A, product divestment and acquisition projects. Specific achievements include in-licensing the GI product Lialda/Mezavant with sales potential of over $400M, leading the teams that bought Transkaryotic Therapies for $1.6BN, Movetis for $550M and Advanced BioHealing for $750M. In 2007 David divested a business to Almirall for $213M.

David acts as advisor to the Venture Group, Sunstone Capital and was formerly a member of the board of Ace BioSciences.

Prior to joining Shire he led GlaxoWellcome’s UK Business Development team and prior to that he was Head of Licensing and Alliances at Novo Nordisk in Denmark. David is a pharmacist by training, he spent part of his early career working in Japan and has a basic command of the Japanese language.

Key challenge for 2012: Continue to invest in high quality assets; in particular deliver on our commitment to build a franchise based on regenerative medicine.

Why you are attending BioBusiness: I’m hoping for the usual set of informative presentations and some excellent networking opportunities.

Who you hope to meet at the event: Key decision makers in the world of Business Development.

John Adamou is head of the U.S. Strategic Transactions and Alliance Management at Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals, Inc., in Ridgefield, CT.

In this role, he leads a team of business development and licensing professionals involved in structuring and negotiating business transactions of global partnerships including technology-based deals, compound in-licensing, asset acquisitions, out-licensing, IP related matters, and other deal arrangements.

John has concluded significant global transactions of multi-year partnerships with biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies located in North America, and Europe. Prior to joining Boehringer Ingelheim in 2002, John held positions in business development at MedImmune Inc., and research at SmithKline Beecham and Allelix Biopharmaceuticals.

He has B.S. and M.S. degrees in molecular biology and genetics from the University of Guelph, Ontario, Canada. John also serves as a Board Member for The Connecticut Business & Industry Association (CBIA).

Key challenge for 2012: Continue to build strategic partnerships that offer innovative opportunities and a competitive advantage

Why you are attending BioBusiness: To stay abreast on relevant issues/challenges impacting the Biotech/Pharma industry

Who you hope to meet at the event: A variety of individuals in the Biotech, Pharma and Investor arena

Jane Buus Laursen, Business Development Director at AstraZeneca, joined the Company in 2003 as a senior scientist and project leader for discovery projects in the cardiovascular and metabolism area.

In 2009 she moved on to business development in AstraZeneca’s Strategic Partnering & Business Development organisation where she was responsible for academic collaborations as well as search, evaluation and transaction of external pre-clinical opportunities in the cardiovascular and metabolism disease area. In May 2011 she was appointed Business Development Director in the Respiratory and Inflammatory BD team and is responsible for evaluation and transaction of externalisation opportunities to strengthen AstraZeneca’s Respiratory and Inflammatory portfolio. Jane graduated from the Technical University of Denmark in 2000 in chemical engineering and received her PhD in Organic and Medicinal Chemistry targeting Natural Product Derived Antibiotics in 2003.

Prior to joining F-star, Dr Kevin FitzGerald was CEO and a main board member of Isogenica Ltd. which he founded in 2000.

Before establishing Isogenica, Kevin was a member of the senior management team at Actinova Ltd., the UK subsidiary of Active Biotech AB. Prior to this, Kevin spent seven years at Cambridge Antibody Technology plc. (acquired by AstraZeneca in 2006) where he was among the founding group of scientists.

Kevin studied for his PhD in the laboratory of Sir Greg Winter FRS at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge and for his MBA at Aston Business School following receipt of a Sainsbury Management Fellowship from the Royal Academy of Engineering, London. Kevin was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine in 2006.

Dr. Michael Capaldi is currently the Director of Edinburgh Quarter.

A UEA Biological Sciences honours graduate, he also has a PhD in Medical Biophysics from the University of Manchester. For the last 26 years he has worked within the biopharmaceutical industry across a range of disciplines in the UK, Europe and the USA. He has worked in pharmaceutical majors such as Ciba Geigy (now Novartis) and SmithKline Beecham (now GSK). In addition, he has held senior executive positions in Nycomed Amersham plc, Core Group plc, Oxford Asymmetry plc, Synaptica Ltd, Scancell Ltd and Hunter-Fleming Ltd. (in the latter three companies as CEO). Dr Capaldi is also currently Chairman of Stealthyx Therapeutics and a director of Synaptica Ltd, Support4Bio Ltd, and CMP Therapeutics (where he recently acted as interim CEO).

Dr. Capaldi has extensive experience of raising capital from private and public markets having helped to raise over £35M since 1997 including an IPO of Core Group plc on the LSE. He also has extensive deal making experience most recently having negotiated the sale of Hunter-Fleming to Newron Pharmaceuticals in 2008.

Dr. Tehseen Salimi, MD, MHA is the Vice President of the Global Evidence and Value Development, Medical Affairs, Research and Development at Sanofi. She is an innovative and impactful medical executive with 20+ years of deep clinical and corporate experience in the healthcare industry. She has strong involvement in managed care and global pharmaceutical arenas. Dr. Salimi is known for her outstanding strategic leadership skills which she developed in complex and rapidly changing environments. She has vast experience in successfully designing and implementing transformational medical initiatives.

Dr. Salimi started her career as an Internist and completed her Preventive Medicine Fellowship at the University of Massachusetts. She also earned her MHA from the Clark University & University of Massachusetts Medical School. Dr. Salimi went on to serve in various positions at Fallon Clinic, Inc and then Cigna HealthCare/Healthsource (formally Central Massachusetts Health Care). During her tenure as a managed care professional she achieved several distinguished awards including the Physician’s Recognition Award for Best Outcomes from Healthsource, and the Superior Achievement Award from Cigna. She was featured in the NCQA’s 1998 Annual Report for the Best Practice Quality Improvement Initiative. Prior to joining Sanofi, Dr. Salimi served for approximately two years at Hoffmann‐La Roche where she was responsible for Portfolio management within the Medical Affairs / Managed Markets Division.

Dr. Salimi is well‐respected and highly credible with a strong network of prominent managed care policymakers. She is seasoned in developing strategic collaborations within various health care segments; and is recognized for building strategic alliances among academia, healthcare delivery systems, payers and other national organizations. Dr. Salimi chairs the International Task Force, and in the past chaired the Quality & Research Committee for the Care Continuum Alliance. She has previously served on the Board of Directors for DMAA (now known as the Care Continuum Alliance) and currently serves on the Board of Directors for e‐Health (a DC based Technology Think Tank Group). She is a member of many other committees including the Value‐Based Benefit Design at the University of MI School of Public Health & Policy and the New Jersey Governor’s Disease Management Study Commission.

Key challenge for 2012: In the current health care environment, bringing a new drug to the market needs not only regulatory approval, but also a favorable decision from key stakeholders like payers and health technology assessors. Payer evidentiary requirements for drug reimbursement have only recently been clarified and the existing R&D model has not uniformly adapted to incorporate these needs. The challenge for the coming years will be to reshape our R&D model to cater to this changing environment of increasing demand for comparative data from payers, physicians, and patients.

Why you are attending BioBusiness? BioBusiness is an excellent platform to network with industry leaders/peers and gain insight into current trends, challenges and future direction of the pharmaceutical/biotech industry. It is also a great forum to debate key challenges/issues facing the overall industry and conduct problem solving as a united pharmaceutical/biotech community.

Who you hope to meet at the event: Pharmaceutical/Biotech industry experts/peers, Business Development & Market Access leaders, Innovators and Venture Capitalists.

Jon Williams leads Medco-UBC’s Strategy and Business Development efforts and is responsible for creating custom solutions for the biopharma industry that leverage Medco and its affiliates’ unique set of capabilities.

He has more than twelve years consulting experience in the healthcare industry, where he has worked extensively with big pharma, large and mid-sized biotechs and medical device companies. He has deep expertise in corporate strategy, business development, product launch strategy, pricing strategy, competitive strategy and inorganic and organic growth strategies, including transactions and due diligence. Jon has developed and commercialized IP in several of these areas, which has helped lead to superior returns for his clients.

Prior to joining UBC, Jon Williams was a Senior Principal in the Los Angeles office of the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and before that he was a Principal at the Monitor Group. He also co-founded an environmental engineering company with offices in Abu Dhabi, Beirut and South Florida. He holds an MBA from the UCLA Anderson School of Management, where he was awarded the Dean’s Scholarship and Stephen J. Welsh and MDE Fellowships. He graduated magna cum laude from Brigham Young University in molecular biology and Japanese.

After completing his post-doctoral research in Germany, Edwin Moses began a commercial career with successful periods spent at Amersham International, Enzymatix and Raggio-Italgene. From 1993-2001, first as CEO and later as Chairman, he was responsible for the growth of Oxford Asymmetry (OAI) through a series of venture rounds cumulating in a flotation (LSE) in 1998 at a value of £120 million. This was followed by a sale of the company to Evotec Biosystems in 2000 for £316 million. During this period, OAI grew from four people to over 250. Over the past eight years, Edwin has played an important role at Board level (primarily as Chairman) in over 15 European life science companies. During this time he has been involved in a number of financing rounds, a series of M&A transactions and four IPOs. He has been Chairman of Ablynx since 2004, and in 2006 he accepted the offer by Ablynx’s Board of Directors to extend his role as Chairman to include that of Chief Executive Officer.

Apart from and in addition to his duties as CEO and Chairman of the Company, Edwin Moses is the Chairman of the Board of Capricorn Health-tech Fund (Belgium) and a member of the Board of Directors of the European Biopharmaceutical Enterprises.

Furthermore, since 2000, in addition to Ablynx, he has been a Board member of: Clinphone Group plc (UK), Fusion IP plc (formerly Biofusion plc) (UK), Phoqus Pharmaceuticals Ltd (UK), Pharmaceutical Profiles Ltd (UK), Proimmune Ltd (UK), Paradigm Therapeutics Ltd (UK), Avantium Technologies (the Netherlands), Ionix Pharmaceuticals Ltd (UK), Evotec OAI AG (Germany), Bioimage A/S (Denmark), Inpharmatica Ltd (UK), Prolysis Ltd (UK), Lectus Therapeutics (UK) and ProPharma Ltd (UK).

Key challenge for 2012: To ensure that our resources are deployed appropriately.

Patrik De Haes has over 20 years of experience in the global health care industry, covering product development, marketing and general management.

He joined from Roche in Switzerland, where he was Head of the Global Insulin Infusion business. Before that, Patrik was President and CEO of Disetronic Medical Systems Inc, a leading company in insulin infusion therapy, in Minneapolis, USA.

At Sandoz Pharma (now Novartis) in Switzerland, he led the global development and commercialization of the first biotech product.

Patrik holds a degree in Medicine from the University of Leuven.

Patrick Amstutz oversees business development and strategic partnering at Molecular Partners. He has been a member of the Executive Committee since its incorporation. He holds a Master of Science from the ETH Zurich and a PhD from the University of Zurich.

At Molecular Partners, Patrick has established a whole range of commercial collaborations and in- and out-licensing agreements, including the collaboration with Centocor (Johnson & Johnson) and the out-licensing of Molecular Partners’ lead asset (MP0112) to Allergan. Further, he is responsible for having achieved full freedom to operate in the DARPin field.

Thomas Senderovitz was born 1965 in Copenhagen, Denmark. He studied Medicine at the University of Copenhagen. After graduating, he practiced internal and general medicine and consulted in clinical pharmacology for six years before joining the pharmaceutical industry. He has also worked as a medical reviewer for the Danish Medicines Agency. He was VP Experimental Medicine and later VP Clinical R&D at Ferring Pharmaceuticals and VP Global Exploratory Development at UCB, Brussels with responsibility for all clinical R&D up to Proof of Concept.

Thomas Senderovitz joined Grunenthal February 2010 as Head of Global Clinical Development, and in January 2011, he was promoted to Executive Vice President, Compound Development & Branding and member of the Grunenthal Group Operatring Committee with overall responsibility for all clinical development , regulatory affairs and global strategic marketing/branding activities. He has given numerous talks on R&D strategy and Open Innovation.

Key challenge for 2012: Development of our future medicines as well as further build our innovative and creative culture.

Why you are attending BioBusiness: I was invited as speaker. I am looking forward to network and to learn from a lot of inspiring people.

Who you hope to meet at the event: People who can inspire me and maybe even find fundament for future business.

Otello Stampacchia, PhD founded Omega Funds in early 2004. Previously, Otello was Partner in charge of life sciences direct investments at Alpinvest Partners, one of the largest private equity asset managers worldwide. At AlpInvest, Otello was responsible for the direct life sciences investments, as well as assisting in due diligence for healthcare venture fund of funds investments.

Before Alpinvest, Otello was the portfolio manager of the Lombard Odier Immunology Fund, a USD $3bn listed investment vehicle, investing in public and private healthcare companies worldwide.

Previously, Otello was a member of the HealthCare corporate finance and M&A team at Goldman Sachs (London and NY offices). Before joining Goldman,Otello helped co-found the healthcare investment activities at Index Securities (now Index Ventures).

Otello has a PhD in Molecular Biology from the University of Geneva (Switzerland), and a PhD in Biotechnology.

David Reynolds is head of Pain & Sensory Disorders licensing within the External R&D Innovation group at Pfizer. He is based at Pfizer’s research unit, Neusentis, in Cambridge, UK. In addition he also scouts in the UK for opportunities across a wide therapeutic area space and looks to establish collaborations between local universities and biotech companies and Pfizer. He has previously led the Internal Medicine Research Unit and the Biomarkers Department for Pfizer at their R&D site in Sandwich, UK.

David is an in vivo expert who has run teams in sexual health & urology at Pfizer and neuroscience at Lundbeck (Copenhagen, Denmark) and Merck Sharp & Dohme (Harlow, UK). David holds a BA in Natural Sciences and a PhD in Neuropharmacology both from the University of Cambridge.

Key challenge for 2012: Finding ways to interact with academia that yields higher returns/lower costs than has typically been the case for such collaborations

Why you are attending BioBusiness: BioBusiness is an excellent opportunity to meet and interact with colleagues in similar roles across the industry

Catherine Sazdanoff joined Takeda’s Global Business Development & Licensing group in December 2006, and became Vice President, Global Licensing in May 2008 after the Millennium acquisition. She subsequently became VP, Corporate Development focusing on global M&A projects, and most recently was co-lead on the Nycomed acquisition in May 2011.

In her new role as VP, Business Development, Catherine heads the TPI GLBD team responsible for global and US/ Europe region product licensing, M&A, and other strategic alliance transactions.

Prior to Takeda, Catherine was employed by Abbott Laboratories, where she held a variety of business and law positions, including Director of Business Development for Abbott’s Pharmaceutical Products Division and Senior Counsel for International Transactions. Other areas of responsibility at Abbott included managing commercial legal operations for Europe and Canada, global litigation, internal investigations, and commercial compliance. Catherine was previously employed at the law firm of Isham, Lincoln & Beale in Chicago.

Catherine has a B.A. in English from the University of Notre Dame and a J.D. from Northwestern University School of Law.

Jan Posthumus, MBA, is Global Head Market Access and Market Research at Basilea Pharmaceuticals in Basel, Switzerland.

In more than 15 years of professional experience in the pharmaceutical industry, he served in several senior management positions as Director Market Access (Novartis Global, Basel), member of the management team of Novartis Pharma AG (Switzerland), market researcher, product manager, business unit leader and Head BD&L.

Jan Posthumus started his professional career as a market researcher for D&S, a Swiss market research agency (specialized on qualitative market research) based in Zürich, Switzerland. Academically, he is completing a PhD degree at the International School for Management in Paris. His main focus is on International Marketing, Market Research and Organizational Development.

Jan holds a MBA degree from IMD, Lausanne, was born in 1961 in the Netherlands, (acquired (additional) Swiss citizenship), is married and has one daughter.

John Rountree is the Managing Partner of NovaSecta, the specialist 'MidPharma' consulting firm. He has over 25 years of experience in management consulting and creating value with all sizes of pharmaceutical and biotech firms worldwide. He founded NovaSecta in 2003 and has built the company with a focus on mid-sized pharmaceutical and biotech companies, working across R&D, corporate/business development and marketing & sales disciplines. John has directed many strategic and management initiatives, achieving amongst others, optimised asset portfolios, corporate evolution into a specialty pharmaceutical company, major licensing deals, improvement of R&D strategic outsourcing, and organisational change.

Prior to founding NovaSecta, John held senior positions in three global consulting firms. He was Head of European Operations at Integral Inc. (now Analysis Group), Director at Strategic Decisions Group (SDG) and Principal at Deloitte Haskins & Sells (now IBM/PWC). John has also raised funds for and developed start-up companies commercially, and has been an executive board member of an intracellular drug delivery spin-out from University of Cambridge and a novel CNS screening technology start-up company.

John holds an MBA from London Business School, and an MA in Engineering, Economics and Management from Brasenose College, Oxford University

James is head of Pfizer’s EU R&D Business Development group and is based at Pfizer’s research unit, Neusentis, in Cambridge UK. James is responsible for a team that evaluates and negotiates new alliances and manages a portfolio of active license and collaboration deals with biotechs, universities and other corporations. James has a strong track record in leading business development activities for several disciplines in Pfizer and for implementing open innovation and creative deals structures.

James joined Pfizer in 1997 and previously worked for Zeneca since 1989. James has a PhD in Chemistry and is an inventor on nine patents.

Malcolm is a partner at Taylor Wessing and Head of the Life Sciences Group in the UK.

He works primarily in the life sciences sector is legal specialisations are:

• Licensing agreements, research and development agreements, collaborations, clinical trials agreements, joint ventures, distribution and manufacturing agreements.
• The commercial and intellectual property aspects of transactions including spin-outs, start-ups, venture capital investments, trade sales and IPOs.
• Contract disputes and patent validity and infringement issues.

He was previously Vice President and General Counsel at Genset in Paris, a NASDAQ listed biotechnology and bioinformatics company. Malcolm speaks regularly on commercial and intellectual property issues. He is also the Company Secretary of One Nucleus, the UK's largest regional biotech network.

Malcolm has a degree in molecular biology and biochemistry from the University of Durham and a Ph.D. in molecular biology from Imperial College, London. He speaks both French and German.

As Bureau Chief, Europe, for Elsevier Business Intelligence, Melanie Senior is responsible for European biopharma content within the company’s flagship health care publications, In Vivo, The In Vivo Blog, Start Up and the Pink Sheet. She has covered the industry for over 10 years, with particular interest in biotech and pharmaceutical dealmaking and strategy, specialty pharma, regulatory trends and biosimilars.

Melanie joined Windhover Information (acquired last year by Reed Elsevier) in September 2000. Prior to that, she worked for the Financial Times in London in various positions including assistant editor on the FT Pharmaceutical and Biotechnology newsletter, and as editor of FT.com's health care page.

Melanie has a First Class BA/MA degree in Natural Sciences from Cambridge University, UK, and speaks three European languages. She grew up in France and Luxembourg.

Mike Ward is editor-in-chief at the Scrip Group focusing on the business challenges facing all stakeholders in the pharma, biotech and medtech industries. He has been covering the life sciences industry for more than 25 years. He has extensive experience in investment banking, consultancy as well as writing about the industry for other leading publications such as Nature, the Economist and BioCentury as well as national newspapers including the Financial Times and International Herald Tribune.

Between 1992 and 2002, Mike was a co-author of many of the European biotech industry reports published by the accountancy houses. In 2010 he was named European Mediscience Commentator of the Year.

Alexander Burstein is Director Business Development of Austrian headquartered Sanova Pharma. Alexander is also President of Europharm SMC, a pan-European pharma association focused on small- and medium-sized companies. Europharm SMC has about 200 members and is headquartered in Brussels. Its main focus is to support (new) business among members, and between members and companies outside Europharm SMC. Europharm SMC is also a stakeholder in the EU institutions (EC, EP, EMA, etc.).

Alexander Burstein looks back on 28 years highly successful years of mostly executive roles in the pharmaceutical industry and in industry associations. He has a proven track record in marketing and sales, since about 10 years Alexander focuses on business development.
Alexander Burstein is a professional developer of diverse cooperations and partnering models, he loves to explore and enter new markets, his passion is to support companies from outside Europe to enter the EU market(s).

Olivier joined the Life Sciences team in 2006. He worked with 3i in Venture Healthcare, with the first four years in Munich and the last two in Paris. Prior to that Olivier was a consultant with Mercer Management Consulting in Munich and Paris.

Olivier holds a PhD in Biology from the Munich Institut für Genetik und Mikrobiologie and has performed his scientific research in Munich and Oxford University.

Olivier is a Director of Endosense, JenaValve, Probiodrug, Noxxon, Sapiens and SuperSonic Imagine.

Why you are attending BioBusiness: BioBusiness is a very good event as its limited size and the quality of the people coming there gives true opportunities to tackle all sorts of BD activities in just two days

With a scientific background, completed by an MBA and more than 15 years of solid experience in multiple roles in the Pharmaceuticals (Pfizer, Novartis, Ipsen), Medical devices (Pfizer medicals) and Diagnostics (bioMerieux) industries, both at national and international/global level, Sandra has now a Global Corporate Business Development position within Almirall, multinational, fully integrated, number one Spanish Pharmaceutical company headquartered in Barcelona (Head, Licensing and Corporate Development).

In this position she is responsible for the identification and management of pan-European opportunities that can enforce the Pipeline of Almirall and therefore consolidate company’s presence in the European markets.

Nilesh joined Merck Serono ventures in 2009 and is focused on investments in Healthcare.

Currently, he serves as Board Observer on f-Star and Auxogyn Board. Along with his responsibilities for the new venture fund, he has led licensing negotiations for both strategic outlicensing and inlicensing opportunities at Merck Serono.

Prior to Merck Serono Ventures, he has worked at Codon Devices, Infinity Pharmaceuticals and Atlas Venture. Nilesh received his doctoral degree in chemical biology and an MBA from Harvard.

Rob joined MSD's European licensing team in Sept 2007 and is responsible for the UK, Ireland, Portugal & Spain.

Before joining MSD, Rob worked in Cambridge University on neuronal injury prosthetics and also cofounded a small company. He spent time in Biotech between 2004-6, advancing programs in CV, metabolic disease & pain from concept to clinic. Previously he held senior positions in Parke Davis, Cambridge, UK, until their acquisition by Pfizer. In 2001 he moved to Pfizer in the USA as senior director for CNS Molecular Science. Collaborations were critical to the success of projects he was involved in at these organizations.

Before he joined the pharmaceutical industry Rob trained in Southampton & spent seven years as a research fellow at the MRC and University of Cambridge. He is also an associate investigator in the Cambridge University Centre for Brain Repair.

Simon’s first career was in real estate, second career in team building and third career in fundraising.

Simon established the Market Research function for international property agent Savills plc, where he gained his first IPO experience. He moved on to Arthur Andersen to develop his corporate finance skills and by then had already established his first startup. In 2004 Simon developed US links for Team Ventures and in 2005 the human capital division (BSG Team Ventures) began trading in London and Boston MA.

In 2006 Simon and two co-founders created IPSO Ventures PLC, investing in biotech and cleantech companies. The team raised hedge fund backing in late 2006 before completing a successful IPO in London in 2007. Team Ventures provided funding advisory input and human capital services to IPSO and Simon stepped back from IPSO in 2010 to focus on the development of Team Ventures’ fundraising division. The new division (Team Kapital) accesses investment from pharma and other corporate venture teams, venture capital houses and major institutional investors for growing biotech and cleantech companies.

Simon has worked in the US and UK, has developed significant corporate and investor relationships in Europe and North America, and is currently developing his access to Asia. His involvement with BioBusiness began in 2009 and he has now chaired events in London, Geneva and Singapore. He has founded or co-founded 11 companies.

Key challenge for 2012: Apart from surviving the demands of three days of acute concentration at BioBusiness, the key challenge is to find investors brave enough to take the top off a pen and sign those heads of terms.

Why are you attending BioBusiness: BioBusiness develops my links across the top echelons of our sector.

Who are you hoping to meet at the event: I don’t get much time to meet new folk at the event but I am interested to link up afterwards with any speaker or delegate with an interest in sourcing equity or building teams.

Bill Taranto joins Merck as Managing Director, Global Health Innovation Fund LLC and Executive Director, Global Health Innovation Group (GHI).

Bill will be responsible for building the GHI capability for Merck. Merck Global Health Innovation (GHI) invests in emerging companies that deliver breakthrough health care solutions and which advance Merck's mission to discover, develop and provide innovative products and services that save and improve lives. GHI has a focused strategic investment approach designed to unlock the full value of health care innovations from around the world.

As a strategic growth investor, GHI's goal is to grow emerging health care solutions into meaningful businesses. Companies we invest in typically have current revenue, a strong business plan and high growth potential.

Bill will be a member of the Innovative Ventures Board, a group that manages the identification and funding of a portfolio of emerging businesses. Bill will also sit on the leadership team with the Strategy Development Group, Strategy Realization Office, and Enterprise Wide Portfolio Management leaders to ensure the sharing of information and networking across the Strategy Office.

Prior to joining Merck, Bill spent 18 years at Johnson & Johnson in various marketing, sales and business development roles with increasing responsibility. In his previous position, Executive Director, Health Care Strategy & Alliances, Bill was responsible for evaluating the future healthcare environment, the viability and impact of health care channels, and the creation of new health care business models.

Bill started his career as a sales representative for Janssen Pharmaceutica and progressed through various sales and marketing positions, including an assignment in Beerse, Belgium. Prior to joining J&J, Bill spent eight years in investment banking. Bill has a Bachelor of Business Administration from St. Bonaventure University.

Michael Boretti joined AVEO Pharmaceuticals in 2008, where he currently is responsible for business development. In his time at AVEO, he has helped establish transformative partnerships with Astellas, Biogen Idec, and OSI Pharmaceuticals. Prior to joining AVEO, he worked in the Life Sciences Practice at L.E.K. Consulting where he led strategic projects for both small biotech and large pharmaceutical clients, including development of corporate and business unit growth strategies, shareholder value management, and business development and M&A transactional support.

Michael received his Ph.D. in bioengineering from the University of Pennsylvania and his B.S. from the University of Virginia.

Damian Marron, a highly experienced executive with strong experience in orphan diseases, has been CEO of Trophos since June 2008.

Under his tenure, Trophos has spearheaded major EU funded consortia of leading global experts and specialists working on orphan diseases including ALS. He has also pushed through a Phase III trial for ALS and attracted EUR 34 million in funding. This includes EUR 10 million from Actelion Ltd for an exclusive option agreement to purchase Trophos for a price that could have reached EUR 195M. Damian brought to Trophos extensive experience in the biotechnology and international pharmaceutical industry, including corporate development, product and technology licensing, research and development, and sales and marketing. His last role was Executive Vice President Corporate Development at NicOx SA, where he was responsible for the establishment of major collaborations with Merck and Co. Inc. and Pfizer Inc. and participated in financing rounds raising in excess of EUR 175M. Prior to NicOx, he held various business development and operational roles at 3M Pharmaceuticals, Orphan Europe, Rhone-Poulenc-Rorer and Glaxo.

Andrew Shindler is a partner in the Life Sciences Group at SJ Berwin with many years’ experience specialising in exploitation of intellectual property and commercial agreements.

Andrew’s pharmaceutical practice focuses mainly on acting for biopharmaceutical companies in research, development and licensing agreements with pharma and distribution and manufacturing arrangements. Andrew has represented clients on deals with many of the world's largest pharma.

Andrew has spoken at and chaired pharmaceutical conferences, authored European Commission research papers on pharmaceutical law, and is past editor of Pharmaceutical Update. Andrew is trustee of the Cardiovascular Research Trust and a member of the Licensing Executives Society.

The Legal 500 directory recommends Andrew for commercial contracts, where his "good depth of knowledge in pharmaceuticals" is acknowledged. Andrew is recommended in Chambers UK and described as "an excellent negotiator … always up to date with what's going on in the industry" and "very good in a fast-moving environment, commercially astute, pragmatic and tenacious."

Jane Hobson works in Baker & McKenzie's London corporate group, is a member of the global M&A practice group and specialises in cross-border mergers and acquisitions and joint ventures in the pharmaceuticals and healthcare sector.

Jane also heads the London office pharmaceutical & healthcare practice group, a multi-disciplinary group focussing on issues facing companies in the pharmaceuticals and healthcare industries. Her recent experience includes advising Prestige Brands on on its agreement to acquire GlaxoSmithKline's North American non-prescription drugs and Carefusion on the divestment of its International Surgical Products business based in Switzerland, with operations in 16 European and Asia-Pacific countries for $130 million.

Constanze Ulmer-Eilfort has more than 15 years experience in advising high technology, pharmaceutical and biotech companies on the commercialization of intellectual property rights.

She advises on a broad range of agreements such as collaboration and license agreements, R&D agreements, agreements with academic institutions and agreements with CROs and CMOs. She is an expert on related issues on Patent Law, European Competition Law and the German Law on Employee Inventions. Among her clients are many of the leading biotech and pharmaceutical companies in Germany.

Will Brown has been with Merrill DataSite since July 2007 and brings with him over 10 years of IT Technical and Management experience.

Will, formally responsible for DataSite clients in the UK and in Italy, and more recently Quebec Canada, is now based in Paris from where he heads up DataSite's European Life Sciences division. During time with Merrill DataSite he has been involved in over 500 projects that have leveraged DataSite’s unique technology.