EXECUTIVE INTERVIEWS

• The Discovering CEO

  In the current world of biopharma companies, the discovery function covers much more than hammering out new drug entities.

• Imagine Pharma’s Multilayered Path To Market

  From the looks of its modest open floor plan lab in Pittsburgh’s uptown, it might not be obvious to the casual observer that Imagine Pharma and its nine-person full-time workforce are developing multiple pharmaceutical products across three distinct platforms.

• Conducting A Drug Development Orchestra To Treat Mental Illness

  Karuna Therapeutics’ late-stage drug for schizophrenia, if approved, could fund the company’s pipeline of next generation psychiatric drugs discovered through a modular constellation of CRO partners.

• Nonprofit Pursues Oncology Drugs

  RebootRX believes that many off-patent pharmaceuticals have cancer-fighting potential, but their generic status makes them unattractive commercial candidates for profit-making pharmas.

• Bayer Brings External Innovation Inside, With Guardrails

  Can Bayer’s “arm’s-length model” for acquired companies help turn the century-and-a-half year-old Big Pharma into a leader in gene and cell therapy, and a top 10 player in oncology?

• Alnylam’s Challenge: Scaling Up And Moving Beyond The Liver

  Alnylam CEO Yvonne Greenstreet talks about what’s next for the company, including a transition into larger therapeutic areas and patient populations, and describes her own journey to the CEO role.  

• KemPharm: Converting FDA Complete Response Letters Into New Opportunities

  KemPharm’s experience in reworking product NDAs following FDA Complete Response Letters has created a unique capability within the company, and helped it move to acquire a potentially valuable asset from distressed biopharma Orphazyme.

• Venture Philanthropy Launches Biotech From Within

  A summary of a discussion with Ben Yerxa, CEO of Opus Genetics, an early-stage gene therapy company launched in 2021 and in unique fashion on the back of the patient advocacy group the Retinal Degeneration Fund.

• A Network And Pivot Model For Success In Cancer Drug Development

  When CEO Avanish Vellanki founded and incorporated Rain Therapeutics on his living room couch in the spring of 2017, there was no drug in development, no money, and a team of only four people.

• Transitioning To Orphan Drug Commercialization: A Q&A With Albireo Pharma’s CEO Ron Cooper

  Albireo Pharma CEO Ron Cooper discusses the company’s three approaches to commercializing orphan drugs globally, and how to go from topline data to regulatory filing in 70 days. 

• Diversity & Inclusion Through The Eyes Of Two Female Pharma Executives

  In the following, we present two first-hand accounts of what it has been like to be a female working in the pharma industry for many years, and what we can all do to overcome the industrywide challenge related to diversity and inclusion.

• Leveling Up By Challenging Assumptions

  An outspoken champion of gender equity and diversity in the workplace, Arcellx CEO Rami Elghandour aims to put the company’s controllable CAR-T therapies on the cover of Time magazine.

• 3 Approaches For Developing Better Drugs To Treat Brain Disorders

  Three organizations pursuing three different strategies for new drug development have one thing in common: optimism about the future of treatments for intractable brain disorders.

• CoCrystal’s Co-CEOs

  Most biopharma industry observers would agree the leadership of a company by two co-equal CEOs is a rare thing. But when it does happen, the unusual arrangement offers useful insights.