Archives: Speakers

• More than 25 years of successful early phase drug development experience delivering pivotal registration studies​
• Holds a Neuro & Molecular Pharmacology Master’s degree​
• Scientific expertise includes design and delivery of cell therapies, targeted small molecules, immune-oncology clinical development plans across rare indications, solid tumor, and hematological malignancies​
• Experience leading global teams and all phases of oncology clinical development programs for both large and mid-size pharmaceutical and biotechnology clients​

Hans-Juergen Arens PhD is currently Vice President of International Clinical Research Services at Frenova Clinical Research.

He has nearly three decades of experience in the pharma and medtech industries and worked previously in global clinical research and development at Takeda, Merck KGaA, and Abbott/AbbVie.

At Fresenius Medical Care he headed the Department of Medical Affairs from 2010 to 2016 for the company’s renal pharmaceuticals international business.

Hans-Juergen uses his expertise to involve himself and his team in directing international clinical trial and data services, supporting clients with medical and operational leadership, as well as consulting services. As Head of Frenova International he has developed a service portfolio dedicated to supporting external sponsor companies in the planning, preparation and execution of clinical trials at centres throughout Europe, Middle East, Africa, Latin America and Asia/Pacific.

He received his PhD in Pharmacology/Toxicology from Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany.

Marco is a biochemist with a strong expertise in Chemical Biology & Drug Development. In his PhD thesis he developed novel methods for fragment-based drug discovery. It was honored by the German Chemical Society with the Klaus Grohe Prize of Medicinal Chemistry. Afterwards he joined the University Chemical Laboratory Cambridge UK, working for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation on novel anti-tuberculosis drugs. During his stay at the University of Cambridge Marco was awarded with a prestigious Marie Curie Fellowship of the European Commission for the development of a novel drug class targeting RNA interference. After returning to Germany he co-founded biotx.ai, a company that develops novel statistical tools for efficacy prediction of drug candidates from population data. biotx.ai has received multiple awards for its machine learning technology specifically designed for the analysis of biomedical data.

Marco provides almost a decade of experience in the biotech ecosystem. He is the author of the textbook “Chemical Biology & Drug Discovery”.

Dr Christine Natasha Ryan holds a PhD in Neuroscience from the University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK and an MBA from Stockholm School of Economics. Following a post-doc at the Brain Research Institute, St. Hans Hospital, Roskilde, Denmark, Dr Ryan remained in Scandinavia moving to Sweden to work at Astra, which then became AstraZeneca, holding line management and competitive intelligence roles. Dr Ryan has engaged in preclinical research at blue chip companies such as AstraZeneca, smaller pharmaceutical companies, CROs and biotechs, working at Karo Bio AB, and Cerca Insights among others. Dr Ryan joined Gabather AB as Principal Scientist in 2017, becoming VP Operations in 2018. She is currently COO.

CEO Dr Michael-Robin Witt holds a Ph.D. in Neuropharmacology from the Royal School of Pharmacy, Copenhagen, Denmark. He has published more than 50 publications in peer-reviewed scientific journals. Following 12 years in academic research, at the Brain Research Institute, St. Hans Hospital, Roskilde, Denmark. MRW has held senior line and project management positions in Scandinavian Biotech companies including Neurosearch AB (1999-2000), AstraZeneca R&D (2000-2003), KaroBio AB (2003-2007). In 2007, MRW co-founded Axcentua Pharmaceuticals AB, acting as CSO for 5 years before joining Lead Discovery Malaysia in 2012 where he currently holds the positions of CEO & CSO. MRW joined Gabather AB in September 2014 and was appointed Principal Scientist in October 2015. He is currently CEO.

A leader with nearly 20 years of experience in Research and Development in the pharmaceutical industry:

Alexion’s (AstraZeneca Rare Disease) Vice President, Global Head of Country Operations Management, Patryk is accountable for driving transformative improvement in the delivery of Alexion Sponsored clinical trial programs and leading the country operations team providing oversight of clinical studies conducted at sites across the Alexion portfolio worldwide.

Patryk was with AstraZeneca for 17 years where he started in 2003, holding various operational and strategic positions: Vice President of the Management Board in 2018-2020, Regional Director Europe for Research and Development in 2016-2020 – both at AstraZeneca Pharma Poland sp. z o.o. Earlier, he had developed his competences in the foreign branches of AstraZeneca in Sweden and Germany and managed and co-founded a Clinical Research Department in Ukraine.

Patryk Mikucki is a graduate of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine in Lublin with the title of Doctor of Veterinary Sciences and PhD in Epizootiology. He is an author of several scientific publications in this field. Moreover, he is a graduate of the Warsaw-Illinois Executive MBA.