Board
Clive Dix, Chairman
Clive Dix has more than 20 years' experience in life science research, with over 15 years in senior pharmaceutical industry positions, and a degree and PhD in Pharmacology. His expertise includes an in-depth understanding of all facets of drug discovery and development, a broad knowledge of the science and commercial landscape of a variety of therapeutic areas, and solid experience of the pharmaceutical business and finance community supporting the sector.
Clive was previously co-founder and Chief Executive of PowderMed Ltd, a vaccines development company acquired by Pfizer in November 2006; and before that he was Senior Vice President, Research and Development and a Board member of PowderJect Pharmaceuticals plc until its acquisition by Chiron Vaccines in 2003. Clive began his career in industry at Ciba-Geigy and then GlaxoWellcome, where he left as UK Research Director in 2001. Clive is a recent past-Chairman of the BioIndustry Association (BIA) and is currently Non-Executive Chairman of Crescendo Biologics and Modern Biosciences plc, and CEO of Convergence Pharmaceuticals Ltd.
David Brown, Non-Executive Director
David Brown has over thirty years’ experience in the pharmaceutical industry both in research and in senior executive roles. He served with four of the top ten Pharma companies: Zeneca, Pfizer, Glaxo, and most recently with F. Hoffman La-Roche as Global Head of Drug Discovery, Roche Pharma. He has extensive experience of pharmaceutical R&D in all phases from early discovery through clinical trials and has experience of leading research in all major disease areas. Whilst at Pfizer he was named co-inventor on the patent for Viagra, and he led the team that developed Viagra through to proof of concept (clinical efficacy) in man. At Roche, David also served on the committee responsible for clinical drug development and he was a core member of the Business Development Committee responsible for in-licensing of products and for technology agreements and acquisitions. David is Chairman of Amura Ltd and Babraham Bioscience Technologies Ltd.
Alan Goodman, Non-Executive Director
Alan Goodman has founded or co-founded many biotechnology and healthcare companies over the last 25 years, including Agricultural Genetics Company, Medeva plc, Chiroscience Group plc, Acambis plc, Oxford BioMedica plc, CeNeS Pharmaceuticals plc, Core Group plc and Amura Limited. He was Chief Executive of Acambis plc, non-executive Chairman of Oxford BioMedica plc and is currently a member of the Supervisory Board of Paion AG and Chief Executive of Avlar BioVentures Limited and a director of a number of private companies.
Mike Romanos, Chief Executive
Mike Romanos is CEO of Crescendo. He has more than 20 years’ biotech and pharmaceutical industry experience, and within the last 10 years has held international executive positions in GlaxoSmithKline R&D before moving to take leadership of Crescendo Biologics. His industry and science experience covers most areas of drug discovery science and technology, and several therapeutic areas. During his career he has made significant contributions to GSK’s drug development pipeline, and broadly to drug discovery strategy and technology. He played a key role in establishing GSK’s advanced antibody lead discovery capability which generated the pipeline of in-house monoclonal antibodies, several of which are in clinical development. Mike’s academic training started with a degree in Natural Sciences at Cambridge, followed by a PhD in Molecular Virology at Imperial College. He then undertook academic research on Virology at the MRC National Institute for Medical Research and in Yeast Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology at the Leicester Biocentre, before being recruited into the biotech arm of The Wellcome Foundation.
Graziano Seghezzi, Non-Executive Director
Graziano Seghezzi brings nearly a decade of European venture capital investment experience to Sofinnova Partners, where he has been a partner focused on life sciences investment since joining the firm in 2006.
Graziano has been instrumental in targeting, investing in, and nurturing the growth of a number of Sofinnova Partners’ portfolio companies, including: Creabilis Therapeutics (Italy), a specialty dermatology company developing products in multiple clinical areas such as psoriasis and atopic dermatitis; GlycoVaxyn (Switzerland), a biotechnology company dedicated to the development of novel vaccines; and Omthera (USA), specialized in cardiovascular disorders with a best-in-class omega-3 drug. Graziano is a board member of each company.
Prior to joining Sofinnova Partners’ Paris-based team, Graziano was principal at Index Ventures in Geneva, Switzerland, where he invested in biotechnology and biopharmaceuticals companies. Before this, he worked for Sofinnova Partners, identifying new investment opportunities in Italian pharmaceutical and medical device companies out of Milan, Italy. Graziano began his career as a biomedical researcher at New York University’s School of Medicine, where he gained five years of hands-on experience studying the molecular mechanism of angiogenesis in oncology and cardiovascular diseases.
Graziano has a degree in genetics and microbiology from the University of Pavia (Italy) and an MBA from the RSM, Erasmus University (Netherlands).