Speakers in 2009

 

Margaret Beer

Margaret Beer studied at the University of Reading (Zoology) and at the University of London (Biochemistry) before carrying out her research work on serotonin pharmacology, leading to the award of her Ph.D, under the supervision of Prof. Derek Middlemiss. She joined Merck, as a neuroscientist, in 1984 following her return to the UK from Stanford University.

She is one of the founding members of the team responsible for the development of Merck’s anti-migraine drug MAXALT and was involved in the project during the basic research stage through to the launch in 1997. Her other main areas of research interest include depression, anxiety and multiple sclerosis.
Margaret joined the Worldwide Licensing and External Research, Europe, group, under the leadership of Dr Ray Hill, in 2003. This group was established in 2002 specifically in recognition of the scientific excellence in Europe and the wealth of potential licensing opportunities. Margaret assumed leadership of the group in 2008 following the retirement of Ray Hill.

She is the co-author of 100 original research articles, review articles, and abstracts, and has presented widely at international professional meetings.

Nigel Cameron

Professor Nigel M. de S. Cameron is President of the Center for Policy on Emerging Technologies in Washington, DC and Research Professor at the Illinois Institute of Technology, where he was until 2008 Director of the Center on Nanotechnology and Society..

His books include The New Medicine: Life and Death after Hippocrates (1991), and he has edited Nanoscale: Issues and Perspectives for the Nano Century (2007). He has been a visiting scholar at UBS Wolfsberg in Switzerland, and a featured speaker at the Aspen Ideas Festival, Aspen Health Forum, and World Healthcare Innovation and Technology Congress. He serves on the advisory board of Nanotechnology Law and Business, and chaired the Technosapiens process that brought together leading liberals, conservatives, and technology leaders with transhumanists, and gave a keynote address at the 2006 Stanford Law School conference on enhancement technologies and human rights.
Professor Cameron has represented the United States on delegations to the United Nations General Assembly and UNESCO, and has been a participant in the U.S./EU dialogue Perspectives on the Future of Science and Technology. He is a member of the U.S. National Commission for UNESCO, and has testified before both houses of Congress, the European Parliament and the European Commission¹s Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies. A native of the UK, he studied at Cambridge and Edinburgh Universities and the Edinburgh Business School.

Fraser Campbell

Until recently Fraser was Associate Director, Capital Markets at Grant Thornton where he advised private and AIM listed companies on regulatory and corporate matters as well as M&A. Prior, was equity analyst at Durlacher (now Panmure Gordon) and other broker houses. Fraser has a PhD from Guy's Hospital and MBA from Imperial College.

 

 

Andrew Dillon

Andrew Dillon is Chief Executive of the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence. NICE advises the NHS, the wider public health community and the public on the best approaches to preventing ill health and treating diseases and conditions.

He graduated from the University of Manchester in 1975 and has held a number of senior management positions in the UK National Health Service, including General Manager of the Royal Free Hospital and Chief Executive of St George’s Healthcare NHS Trust, both academic medical centres in London. He has contributed to national policy on the allocation of research and development funding in the NHS, and has been a member of the UK Department of Health’s International Panel and its Health Industries Task Force.

He has contributed to a number of international policy forums, including an OECD review of approaches to the adoption of new and emerging health related technologies and the European Commission funded European Collaboration for Assessment of Health Interventions project. He was a non-executive director of HTAi an international collaboration of agencies, individuals and corporations involved in the development and application of health technology assessment, between 2003 and 2005. He led a review of the Canadian drug evaluation agency in 2005.

He helped establish NICE as its founding Chief Executive in 1999.

Clive Dix

Clive has over 22 years’ experience in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries, encompassing business leadership, project management and drug development. He was formerly founder and Chief Executive Officer of PowderMed Ltd and led their sale to Pfizer Inc in October 2006. Prior to that he was the Senior Vice President, Research and Development of PowderJect Pharmaceuticals plc, which was acquired by Chiron for £550 million in 2003. He also held a senior position at Glaxo Wellcome as the UK Research Director where his role included co-chairing the management group that oversaw all of the company’s research projects worldwide. Clive is currently Chairman of the Bioindustry Association and Non-executive Chairman of Modern Biosciences plc and Auralis Ltd.

William Dolphin

Dr Dolphin holds a PhD in biophysics obtained from Boston University. He held appointments as Professor in the Departments of Biomedical Engineering and Biology at Boston University, has authored more than 60 peer-reviewed scientific articles, holds 5 US and international patents and was twice recipient of the National Research Service Award from the US National Institutes of Health.

Dr. Dolphin founded and served as CEO of a US medical device company which in 2000 and 2001 was ranked among the fastest growing technology companies in the US by Deloitte and Touche and was subsequently acquired by a major NADAQ-listed medical technology company.

Dr. Dolphin has served as CEO and Director of numerous private and public companies in the United States, New Zealand, Australia and the United Kingdom. He has significant experience in successfully bringing early stage technology companies to profitability and has significant M&A experience, having led the purchase and sales of four medical technology companies.

Dr. Dolphin is currently the CEO and executive director of Avita Medical, a medtech company with products in the field of Regenerative Medicine and Tissue Engineering. Avita Medical is publicly traded on the Australian Stock Exchange (ASX:AVH).

Simon Donnell

Simon Donell is a Consultant Trauma & Orthopaedic Surgeon and the lead for research in the Department of Orthopaedics at the Norfolk & Norwich University Hospital. He holds an honorary Readership with the Medical School at the University of East Anglia, funded by the charity Action Arthritis. He is currently Co-Editor of The Knee journal, and a Specialist Advisor to NICE on the Interventional Procedures Programme.

Research interests cover the range of musculoskeletal disease in collaboration with other disciplines. Current projects include; studies on matrix metalloproteinases in articular cartilage and synovium, as well as Dupuytren’s disease with Prof Ian Clark in the School of Biology UEA, health economic assessments for the Department of Health on bone morphogenetic protein (which may make fractures heal quicker) with the health economists in the School of Medicine UEA, studies on the outcome of various joint replacements funded by industry, commercially sponsored studies on bone morphogenetic proteins and accelerated healing of fractures, clinical studies on patellar instability and hypermobility including new imaging techniques and possible genetic causes, an educational programme to train novice surgeons and other healthcare workers in knee replacement, and a programme to improve information for patients with video/DVD to help discharge from hospital.

Tim Edwards

Tim is a Director of the BioIndustry Association, the trade association for innovative enterprises in the UK's bioscience sector; Chairman of The Mulberry Bush Organisation, a charity founded in 1948 providing therapeutic and residential care for children aged 5-12 with severe emotional and behavioural difficulties; and a Fellow of the RSA, a charity founded in 1754 which drives ideas, innovation and social change. From 2005-2007, Tim was Chairman of ReOx Limited, a biotech company spun out of the University of Oxford by Peter Ratcliffe FRS and others from the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics.

Tim lives in Oxfordshire and is married with 3 sons.

Sam Fazeli

Sam Fazeli, Ph.D.
sam.m.fazeli@pjc.com
Ph: +44 (0)20 3142 8746
Universe: European Biotechnology
Sam Fazeli is a managing director, head of European research, and senior research analyst focused on European biopharmaceutical stocks. Fazeli joined Piper Jaffray in 2005. Fazeli and his team cover 20 UK and Continental European stocks. Fazeli has 13 years' experience in the biopharmaceutical sector. Previously, he was at Nomura where he was part of a team that was ranked No. 1 in the U.K. in the September 2004 Institutional Investor Survey of U.K. Small Cap Fund Managers. In 2008, Fazeli was ranked 3rd in the Extel Biotech Survey of UK institutions. Fazeli has a Ph.D. in Pharmacology and seven years' post-doctoral experience.

Eddie French

Eddie French is currently Director of the UK Pharmaceutical Sciences Vaccines Delivery Group within Pfizer Global R&DHe has been at Pfizer for over 14 years working in the area of drug delivery, formulation and analytical science. His main interest is in the field of biotechnology looking at the pre-formulation, formulation and characterisation of biopharmaceuticals, notably proteins and nucleotides. He also has a wide experience of drug product development for Pfizer’s inhaled drug portfolio. This included involvement in the inhaled insulin (Exubera™) project

Eddie has a BSc in Biochemistry and gained a PhD in the area of transdermal drug delivery from the School of Pharmacy at the University of Bath. After his PhD he remained at Bath and was appointed as a lecturer in Pharmaceutics, a position he held for 3 years. Following this he transitioned to industry first working for the drug delivery company RP Scherer in Swindon after which he joined Pfizer Global R and D at Sandwich.

Eddie is the current Chairman of the Academy of Pharmaceutical Scientists of Great Britian (APSGB) and also a visiting senior lecturer at Kings College London. In any spare time he has he is a keen on all sports and games and outdoor activities. Sometimes he can still be seen puffing round the rugby field, although as his body reminds him, he should really know better.

 

Tim Haines

Tim Haines, Partner has more than 25 years of international management experience in the life sciences industry. Before joining Abingworth in 2005 he was Chief Executive of the Abingworth portfolio company, Astex Therapeutics. Tim was with Astex for more than five years and was instrumental in establishing it as one of the leading UK biotechnology companies. Previously, Tim was Chief Executive of two divisions of the publicly-listed medical technology company, Datascope Corp. Prior to Datascope, he held a number of other senior management positions in the US and Europe, including CEO of Thackray Inc and General Manager Baxter UK. Current and past board positions include Astex Therapeutics, Fovea, HBI, IMI, PowderMed, Stanmore Implants and XCounter. Tim has a BSc from Exeter University and an MBA from INSEAD. At Abingworth, he identifies and creates new businesses and provides support for portfolio companies.

Ian Harris

After starting his business career in sales with Schering, Ian moved to ICI/Zeneca where over a twelve year period he held a number of sales, marketing and business management roles including a four year secondment to Riyadh.
Ian then spent four years in marketing consultancy during which time he led a number of high profile European projects for such companies as Monsanto and Novartis. This was followed by a move into technology markets, where his experience includes leading several start-up businesses. Since early 2003 Ian has been CEO of CCL where he has lead the business turn-around into a focused, fast growing medical technology company with exciting potential.

 

Shamus Husheer

Dr. Shamus Husheer is the CEO/CTO of Cambridge Temperature Concepts Limited (CTC), a privately held medical devices company. He holds a PhD. in chemistry from the University of Cambridge, specialising in instrumentation. Dr. Husheer is the inventor of the technology behind CTC, based around continuous body temperature monitoring, and has been responsible for both technical and business development. A prolific inventor and entrepreneur, Dr. Husheer has founded three companies in his native New Zealand and a further three in the UK to exploit inventions ranging from medical devices to industrial chemical processes to automated market research.

 

Nigel Job

Nigel founded Remtec Search and Selection Ltd in May 1998, with an objective to provide the very highest level of specialist recruiting service to the Life Sciences and Medical Technology industries. Prior to founding Remtec, Nigel worked within the diagnostics and medical device industries (Sarstedt, Medtronic, Caledonian Medical/Angeion). in a variety of roles(Clinical Applications, Sales, and Marketing Management). Since founding the company, Nigel has accumulated extensive experience of senior management executive search for SMEs and "blue-chip" clients.

Ruth Keir

Ruth heads the Strategic Alliances unit within Pfizer’s Worldwide Business Development department. In this capacity, she leads a team located in the UK, US and Australia responsible for technology licensing, research collaboration and alliance management activities. The team scope covers Research, Pharmaceutical Sciences and Drug Safety R&D, across all therapeutic areas of interest.

A pharmacologist by background, Ruth has 25 years of pharmaceutical industry experience, gained initially within discovery research progressing candidates from idea to clinic.

Kevin Lee

Kevin Lee is a vice president of drug discovery at GlaxoSmithKline. In addition to leading a drug discovery performance unit within the Immuno-Inflammation CEDD, Kevin has led the CEDD’s externalisation activities that has seen over 50% of the CEDD's research activities become partnered.

Kevin studied pharmacy at Nottingham University followed by a PhD in pharmacology at Cambridge. After postdoctoral training at the Vollum Institute in Portland, Kevin joined the Parke Davis Research unit in Cambridge. Prior to joining GSK, Kevin founded Cambridge Biotechnology (acquired by Biovitrum) and Neurosolutions (now Neurodiscovery - ASX code: NDL).

 

Eddy Littler

Eddy has a degree and PhD from the University of Leeds. After 10 years in academia he joined the Wellcome Research Laboratories eventually becoming Head of the Gene Targets Department. In 1995 joined GlaxoWellcome as Head of Antiviral Research. In 2001 he left GSK to join Medivir as Senior Director of Lead Discovery and the UK site. After 6 years at Medivir Eddy joined Domainex as Chief Executive Officer. He sits on the SAAB of Tibotec and the Infection and Immunity Board and Translational Research Groups at the MRC.

John Loveluck

John is a physicist with 42 Technology in St Ives (Cambs) who has spent much of his career transferring high tech products from development into manufacture, concentrating on process improvement and control. Over the last 10 years he has specialised in medical device manufacturing, quality and regulatory affairs, and has worked on a wide range of manufacturing processes and product developments.

Andrew Lynn

Dr. Andrew Lynn received his PhD in Materials Science from the University of Cambridge. His experience in the field of orthopaedics and regenerative medicine spans seven years and four countries; it includes the initiation, management, and implementation of product-focused programmes involving artificial prostheses for joint replacement and tissue regeneration scaffolds for orthopaedic, neurosurgical, and thoracic applications. He has worked extensively with world-renowned surgeons on initiatives to develop regenerative medical treatments for hard and soft tissues, including a preclinical development programme for a nerve-regeneration product currently in use for over 500 patients in Japan. Dr. Lynn founded OrthoMimetics on the basis of his doctoral research conducted in conjunction with a team of colleagues from the University of Cambridge, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Harvard University

 

Graeme Martin

Dr. Martin is President and CEO of TRI with day-to-day responsibility for operations. He brings more than 28 years of pharmaceutical R&D experience, primarily in multinational Pharmas (Wellcome; Glaxo Wellcome: Hoffman La Roche). He was responsible for the discovery and preclinical development of Zomig®, marketed worldwide for the acute treatment of migraine. More recently, Dr. Martin served as Chief Technical Officer at Telik Inc. with responsibility for technology and business development before establishing a Bay Area biopharmaceutical consulting operation, Discovery-Insight. Dr. Martin received his Bachelor of Science degree in Pharmacology from the University of Bath, and his doctorate from University College, London, UK.

 

David Mott

David Mott joined venture capital firm New Enterprise Associates (NEA) in September 2008 as a General Partner focused on biopharmaceutical investments. Prior to NEA, Mr. Mott was President and Chief Executive Officer of MedImmune, subsidiary of AstraZeneca Plc, and Executive Vice President of AstraZeneca. He joined MedImmune in 1992 and served in roles of increasing responsibility, including COO, CFO, President and CEO. He led the sale of MedImmune to AstraZeneca in June 2007 for $15.6 billion, the largest biotech acquisition to date. Mr. Mott is currently a director of Shire plc (NASDAQ: SHPGY) and Rib-X Pharmaceuticals.

 

 

Christopher Newton

Dr. Newton was appointed to BioFocus in 2005. Between 2000 and 2005, he was a founding scientist and CSO and Board Director at Argenta Discovery Ltd. From 1979 to 2000, he held a variety of senior management positions in both research and development in the Rhone-Poulenc group of companies, working on a variety of projects, some of which reached clinical trials. Dr. Newton holds a degree in Natural Sciences from the University of Cambridge and is Emeleus chemistry prize holder of that university. He earned his PhD at the University of Sheffield in 1979, for which he was awarded the Turner Prize. Dr. Newton has been appointed to visiting academic fellowships and professorships associated with the University of Warwick (1994-1998) and the University of Essex (1995-1999) during his industrial career.

 

Ian Oliver

Ian specialises in serving health sciences clients and is based in Reading. He has fourteen years experience with a wide variety of fast-growth listed and pre-IPO biotechnology, medical devices and pharmaceutical companies in the UK and US.

Ian completed two years in the Palo Alto, California practice supporting health sciences clients with risk management and assurance, Sarbanes Oxley 404 compliance, transactions and NASDAQ initial public offerings. Prior to joining Ernst & Young, Ian graduated from Oxford University with bachelors and masters degrees in Chemistry, with research focusing on genetic engineering.

Ian represents the UK in Ernst & Young’s Global Biotechnology team and is UK spokesperson for Ernst &Young’s annual thought-leading publication, Beyond Borders – Global Biotechnology Report.

Cormac O'Prey

Professional Background

Senior Engineering Consultant

specialising in product development in the medical sector. 8yrs+ experience in product development consultancy preceded by product development work on office machinery, development of petrochemical heat exchangers and work in Esso's Fawley refinery

Primary Area of Expertise

Medical device product development, particularly drug delivery devices, medical production test equipment, laboratory equipment etc. Special interest in risk analysis, design verification and design quality tools

Current and previous Affiliations

Sit on BSI committee for BS 8887: Design for Manufacture, Assembly, Disassembly and End of Life.
Occasional attendee at R&D Society lectures

Objectives at this conference

Explore opportunities for medical product developments in the local area

Antoine Papiernik

Antoine Papiernik is a Managing Partner and he invests in life sciences. He joined Sofinnova Partners in 1997. Antoine started his career in private equity in the Caisse des Dépôts group, first with CDC-Participations, then in its newly formed venture capital arm, CDC-Innovation, where he invested exclusively in life sciences. Since joining Sofinnova Partners, Antoine has been an initial investor and active board member in European companies like Actelion, Addex and NovusPharma, which went public on the Zürich stock exchange and the Milan Nuovo Mercato and in US companies like Cotherix and Kosan. He has also invested in and is a board member of Corevalve, Diatos, EOS, Fovea, Lectus, Movetis, Orexo-Biolipox (quoted on the Stockholm stock exchange), SpineVision and Stentys. Antoine has an MBA from the Wharton School of Business, University of Pennsylvania.

Parkinson's Disease Society

Parkinson’s Disease Society, which celebrates its 40th anniversary this year, has invested over £40million in research into all aspects of Parkinson’s. This strengthens the PDS’s position as the largest non-commercial funder of Parkinson’s research in the UK.

Last year, the Society awarded over £4.2million to 34 new projects around the UK focused on finding better treatments and a cure for Parkinson’s.

PDS-funded research covers a broad range of topics include gene therapy, stem cells, surgery, how to improve day to day living for people with Parkinson’s, and non-motor problems associated with Parkinson’s such as sleep disorders, depression, dementia and compulsive behaviours. It is particularly keen to invest in new researchers through its Ph.D. student and senior research fellowship research programmes.

 

Linda Pomeroy

Linda Pomeroy has worked, over the past eight years, in the IT industry primarily as a service and project manager. This has included managing and developing business with strategic partners and developing a commercial awareness, an understanding of business concepts and models and considering strategic decisions. In addition, Linda has worked for an IT start up company which was floated on the NASDAQ in 2000.

 

 

Andy Richards

Dr Andy Richards is a serial Biotechnology entrepreneur and business angel. He is currently a director of Vectura plc, Summit plc, Biowisdom, Theradeas, Cancer Research Technology (commercial arm of CR-UK) Babraham Bioscience Technology, Aitua and is Chairman of Altacor.

Andy has a PhD in Chemistry and spent his early career with ICI (now AstraZeneca) and with PA Technology. He was a founder of Chiroscience and an executive director through to the sale to Celltech in 1999. Since that time he has been founding and investing in new biotechnology companies including several of those listed above as well as Arakis, Geneservice, Cambridge Biotechnology Ltd, Amedis Pharmaceuticals, Sirus Pharmaceuticals Daniolabs and Pharmakodex, all of which were recently sold. He is a director of the Bioindustry Association (BIA), a member of the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), a member of the UK Life-sciences Marketing Strategy Implementation Board, a founder member of the Cambridge Angels, the founding Chairman of BIA Bioangels and an advisor to Toscana Life Sciences.

 

Gareth Roberts

Dr Roberts has extensive experience in the biotechnology industry and in the applications of a range of technologies for developing new approaches to therapy. Gareth taught Anatomy at Imperial College school of Medicine, London) and later joined industry as a Group Director of research for SmithKline Beecham (a global pharmaceutical company). He has presented at meetings and symposia all over the world on the issues and strategies for incorporating new technologies into healthcare development. He has published 4 books, more than 40 patents and over 150 papers. He has been guest lecturer on a number of MBA Entrepreneurship programmes.

He is an experienced entrepreneur, having been involved in the founding of 5 biotechnology companies, raising over £30 million in investment finance in the process (Sciona, Proteom, NovaThera). Gareth has also extensive experience in raising grant funding for research and development. Recently with NovaThera, he has managed to secure two large DTI grants and EEC funding (combined value of £4million+) to support research and development work. NovaThera was acquired by MedCell in July 2008.

Gareth has served on the Board of the British Library and teaches karate in his spare time. Gareth’s latest venture is PneumaCare. PneumaCare was founded (by Gareth, Richard Iles and Ward Hills) in February 2008 and is pioneering the development of non-invasive medical monitoring devices. PneumaScan™ their first product is a new generation device for monitoring lung function which is undergoing clinical trials.

Barbara Sahakian

Barbara Jacquelyn Sahakian, FMedSci,
Professor of Clinical Neuropsychology
University of Cambridge Department of Psychiatry and
Behavioural and Clinical Neuroscience Institute
Cambridge, UK
Tel: 44-1223 331209/Fax: 44-1223 336968 Email:jenny.hall@cpft.nhs.uk

Barbara J Sahakian is Professor of Clinical Neuropsychology at the Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge School of Clinical Medicine and Honorary Consultant Clinic Psychologist at Addenbrooke’s Hospital. She has an international reputation in the fields of cognitive psychopharmacology, neuroethics, neuropsychology, neuropsychiatry and neuroimaging. She is co-inventor of the CANTAB computerised neuropsychological tests, which are in use world-wide. She is probably best known for her research work on cognition and depression, cognitive enhancement using pharmacological treatments, neuroethics and early detection of Alzheimer’s disease. Indeed, she has over 300 publications covering these topics in scientific journals, including Science, Nature, Nature Neuroscience, The Lancet, British Medical Journal, Archives of General Psychiatry, American Journal of Psychiatry, Biological Psychiatry, the Journal of Neuroscience, Brain, Psychopharmacology and Psychological Medicine. Her current programme of research, funded by the Wellcome Trust and Medical Research Council, investigates the neurochemical modulation of impulsive and compulsive behaviour in neuropsychiatric disorders, such as unipolar and bipolar depression and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. This topic was the focus of her recent papers published in Science, (Chamberlain et al 2006, Chamberlain et al 2008).

Professor Sahakian is a Fellow of Clare Hall and Bye-Fellow of Christ’s College.

Harald Schmidt

Harald Schmidt studied philosophy, linguistics and history at the Universities of Bremen, Oxford and Muenster. He went on to work with the Research Centre for Bioethics at the University of Muenster, the German Ministry of Health and the German Parliament. Harald joined the Nuffield Council on Bioethics in 2002 as Assistant Director and over the past seven years has been involved with projects on pharmacogenetics, GM crops, animal research and public health. He is currently running the Council’s Working Party on ‘Medical profiling and online medicine: The ethics of 'personalised' health care in a consumer age’. He is also working on a PhD at the London School of Economics on personal responsibility for health.

Sunil Shah

Sunil Shah is the CEO of O2h. He was previously the Director of Business Development at Cambridge Biotechnology (now Biovitum). He has consulted into a range of biotechnology companies and major pharmaceuticals such as Pfizer, GSK, and BASF via Private consulting and the Life Sciences group of PA-Consulting. Prior to co-founding O2h, he was the co-founder and Director of a technology company. The Non Executive board positions he holds include those with Opal Drug Discovery Ltd and IOTA Pharmaceuticals Ltd. He holds an MBA from Cambridge University and a BSc in Biochemistry and is a member of the Royal Society of Chemistry.

John Shields

John Shields, Principal, Science and Technology has 13 years of operational experience in life science companies. He joined Abingworth in 2001 from Cantab Pharmaceuticals where he was Senior Vice-President, Research. He had a strong role in business development and played a significant part in the in-licensing of new products and technologies to the firm. Prior to Cantab, he was at the Glaxo Institute for Molecular Biology in Geneva, Switzerland. From 1982 to 1988, he held research positions at the Institute of Child Health, the University of London, UK. John has a PhD in Immunology from the University of Glasgow. He has published more than 30 papers in peer-reviewed journals including Science. At Abingworth, John is involved with scientific evaluation of new and existing investments and works closely with UK universities and early-stage companies.

 

Roger Thorpe

Roger Thorpe is Managing Director of Hope Enterprises and has provided consultancy services to industry for the last 13 years. Sectors covered to date include Automotive, Motorsport, Industrial, Construction, Aerospace, Rail, Banking, Healthcare and the NHS. Traditionally the core services he provides to his customers has been structured problem solving and problem avoidance, in the guise of ‘Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (FMEA)’ where weaknesses in the design of products, processes or equipment are considered.
Since June 2008 he has worked closely with the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital radiology department on a pioneering software solution known as Pure Mesh to assist the department in the analysis of their waiting lists. In November 2008 he won the ERBI Medtec award for working in partnership with the NHS. Recently the software has identified opportunities for the MRI modality to restructure their working hours with the potential to negate the need for the use of costly mobile scanners.
The wider application of the software is now being considered.

Chris Torrence

Dr. Chris Torrance has twelve years oncology research and drug development experience, including six years as a senior manager at Cambridge-based pharmaceutical company, Vernalis.
Chris founded Horizon Discovery in 2007 to accelerate the search for new and improved ‘Personalised Medicines’ that target the underlying genetic defects that drive cancer and other complex diseases; and which vary in their number and composition from one patient to another.

Central to realizing this ambition is Horizon’s proprietary gene-engineering technology called ‘GENESIS’; which enables the routine generation of accurate and genetically-defined ‘X-MAN’ (Mutant And Normal) human disease models that can be used to rationally find and tailor ‘the right drugs’ to ‘the right patients’.

Based on this innovative technology platform and a ‘bootstrap’ funding model, Chris and his colleagues have quickly established a profitable biotechnology company in Cambridge UK that proudly works with many of the world’s leaders in R&D; such as Genentech, Novartis and Cancer Research UK.

Chris has a bachelor’s degree in Biomedical Technology from Sheffield Polytechnic; a PhD in Biochemistry from East Carolina University (U.S.A) and completed Post-Doctoral training with Professor Bert Vogelstein at the Johns Hopkins University (U.S.A), where he pioneered the use of X-MAN cancer models in high-throughput drug discovery.

Mark Treherne

Mark obtained his PhD in neuropharmacology from Cambridge University with funding from Merck. He then went on to complete a post-doc on diabetes, before holding a faculty position at the Biozentrum in Basel. Mark now has over 20 year's experience in the discovery of novel treatments for diseases of the central and peripheral nervous systems, including Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases. Mark was formerly at Pfizer in the UK, where he was responsible for research into neurodegenerative diseases. On leaving Pfizer in 1997, Mark set up Cambridge Drug Discovery as Chief Executive, which was sold to BioFocus in 2001 for £28 million. Mark has now been involved in raising over £90 million for various early-stage biotechnology companies and has been Chief Executive of Senexis Limited since 2002.

J Mark Treherne BSc, MPhil, PhD. Mark obtained his PhD in receptor neuropharmacology from Cambridge University with funding from Merck. He then went on to complete a post-doc on diabetes, before holding a Senior Faculty position at the Biozentrum in Basel.

Mark now has over 20 year's experience in the discovery of novel treatments for diseases of the central and peripheral nervous systems, including Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases.

Mark was formerly at Pfizer in the UK, where he was responsible for research into neurodegenerative diseases. On leaving Pfizer in 1997, Mark set up Cambridge Drug Discovery as Chief Executive, which was sold to BioFocus in 2001 for £28 million. Mark has now been involved in raising over £60 million for various early-stage biotechnology companies and is Chief Executive of Senexis.

 

Barry Wilson

Barry W. Wilson is an international executive with 40+ years of experience in both the pharmaceutical and medical device industries. He has served as President of Medtronic International, President of Lederle International, prior to its merger with Wyeth, and President of Bristol Myers Squibb Europe. He had nine international assignments with Pfizer. Mr. Wilson is currently Chairman of Heartscape Technologies and serves on the Board of Directors of Welch Allyn, Atani Pharma, NextPharma Technologies, Anecova and The Rezidor Hotel Group. He also advises several Private Equity and Venture Capital organisations.