Daan Ellens
Chairman

Mr. Ellens has a PhD in molecular biology from the State University of Utrecht and an MBA from the University of Eindhoven. He joined the pharmaceutical group AKZO-Nobel in 1980. In 1994, he became CEO of RheinBiotech where, thanks to a successful IPO and a 2002 merger with Bema Biotech, he turned the company into a major player in vaccinology. Ellens has his own biotechnology consultancy firm, Elkerim. He is a board member of Zealand Pharma (Denmark), RheinBiotech (Netherlands) and 4-Antibody (Switzerland).

Bernhard Ehmer

Fresenius Biotech

Dr Bernhard Ehmer is currently CEO of Fresenius Biotech GmbH, a subsidiary company of the Fresenius Health Care Group, focused on the development, marketing and commercialization of biopharmaceuticals in the fields of oncology and transplantation medicine. At Merck KGaA, Dr Ehmer was successively Head of Clinical R&D Operations (1998-2000), Vice-President for the Business Area Oncology (2000-2005) and for Corporate Strategic Planning and Alliance Management (2005). His leadership played a key role in the development, registration and launch by Merck KgaA of cetuximab (Erbitux(R)), a chimeric monoclonal antibody targeting the EGF receptor from Imclone, for cancer indications outside North America. He also mastered a cooperation agreement with Takeda on matuzumab, a humanized monoclonal antibody against EGFR, developed by Merck KGaA.

Before joining Merck KGaA, Dr Ehmer spent 12 years with Boehringer Mannheim GmbH in various clinical R&D and management positions in Germany, Italy and Singapore. Among his major achievements was the extension of the therapeutic indications of recombinant erythropoietin to the supportive treatment of cancer.

Dr Ehmer was resident in Internal Medicine at a teaching hospital of the University of Heidelberg from 1983 to 1986, after having graduated from the universities of Munich and Heidelberg (1976-1982). He is the author or co-author of about 60 scientific articles and co-editor of a book on the use of recombinant erythropoietin in cancer (1996).

Paul Geenen

Rendex

Mr. Paul C. Geenen received a Master of Science degree in Bio-engineering from the University of Louvain in 1973. He completed an Executive MBA program at the Antwerp Business School in 1992. He started his career at ELI LILLY in Brussels where he was responsible for clinical trials with antibiotic products. After five years he joined the international marketing team at the head quarters of ORGANON TEKNIKA, a pharmaceutical business unit of AKZO NOBEL. At ORGANON TEKNIKA he was responsible for the worldwide introduction of blood bank products & clinical diagnostics systems, for business planning and R&D programs. His International marketing management responsibilities included in-licensing activities as well as involvement in M&A projects. After completing his MBA, he became General Manager, extending his responsibilities to the fields of anesthesia and cancer treatment products, and he engaged in marketing coaching of small businesses. Paul Geenen started in Venture Capital with Rendex Partners in 1999 and currently holds board seats at Hybrigenics, Rendex and Silicos.

René Kuijten

Life Sciences Partners

Dr René Kuijten joinded LSP in early 2001 as a general partner. He serves or has served on the supervisory boards of KuDOS (UK, acquired by AstraZeneca in 2005), DNage (NL, acquired by Pharming in 2006), OctoPlus (NL), Kreatech (NL), Hybrigenics (F), BMEYE (NL) and Trinity (US) and has led LSP’s investments in Zealand Pharma (DK) and Morphochem (G, acquired by Biovertis in 2005).

René is also a jury member of New Venture, a business plan competition, and a board member of the McKinsey Alumni Association and the Max Geldens Society. He recently was a member of the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences committee, advising the Dutch government on gene patenting. From 1992-2000, René was a senior manager at McKinsey & Company in Amsterdam, Brussels and Zurich, and co-leader of the European Pharmaceuticals and Health Care Practice. In this capacity, he advised the management boards of several multinational companies on strategy, M&A, performance improvement and restructuring.

René was trained as a Medical Doctor at the University of Utrecht, Harvard Medical School and the Mayo Clinics. He completed his PhD studies at the University of Pennsylvania Cancer Center and published in medical journals as the New England Journal of Medicine and Cancer Research. He has received research awards from the World Health Organization and the International Union Against Cancer, and the Talma Eijkman Prize and the U-Gene Research Award for his scientific endeavors. He obtained his MBA degree from INSEAD in Fontainebleau, France.

Arthur Donny Strosberg

Prior to co-found Hybrigenics, Pr. Strosberg has been an advisor to several major pharmaceutical companies and has been involved in other start up biotechnology companies. Pr. Strosberg is a specialist in the development of screening technologies especially applied to small molecules binding to membrane receptors expressed in bacteria, in yeast and in mammalian cells. Together with his CNRS laboratory which moved successively from the Paris Science faculty to the Pasteur and then the Cochin Institute, he published over 400 peer-reviewed scientific articles. He holds over twenty patents of which more than two-thirds are licensed to pharmaceutical companies.

Eric Castaldi

Eric Castaldi is CFO and a member of the Executive Committee of NicOx SA, an emerging pharmaceutical company listed on Eurolist in Paris, and which is specialized in the research and development of nitric oxide-donating drugs. Eric Castaldi joined NicOx in 1998 and was in charge of the company’s IPO in November 1999 and subsequent financings for a total of €312m, including a public follow-on, Private Investment in Public Equities (PIPE) offerings and a rights issue.
As a graduate in Finance, Accountancy and Administration from the University of Nice, Eric Castaldi started his career as Financial and Cost Accountant from 1986 to 1989 for Cordis Corporation, a US based company specialized in bio-surgical instrumentation. He joined in 1989 through 1997 My Kinda Town plc, a European leisure company, as CFO and COO, and served, after that, Safety Kleen Corporation, a U.S. based environmental waste company as CFO, where he was responsible for operations in France and Belgium.

Rémi Delansorne

CEO, Hybrigenics

Rémi DELANSORNE is 48 years old. He holds a veterinary doctorate from “Ecole Nationale Vétérinaire d’Alfort” and a PhD in life sciences from « Université Pierre et Marie Curie » (Paris VI). After a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Texas Medical School in Houston, he joined the pharmaceutical industry in 1985 in Theramex, where he held several positions in pre-clinical R&D.until the company was integrated into the Merck Group (now Merck-Serono) in 2000. In 2002. Rémi Delansorne became Merck Global Head of Diabetes Research and responsible for the three preclinical sites in France. Then, he joined Hybrigenics in 2004 as Vice-President for R&D and was appointed CEO of the company in September 2005.

Advisors

Stefan Beil

AVIDA Group

Stefan Beil, Ph.D., joined AVIDA Group in 2004 as Partner and Managing Director of several venture capital funds. Before that he was responsible as Investment Director for the life sciences activities with ERGO Equity GP GmbH. Prior to joining ERGO, Dr. Beil was a Partner from 1998 to 2003 with the international private equity firm IMH Venture GmbH. Dr. Beil serves on several boards including as Chairman of Biobase GmbH, as a Director of Neurotech SA, and as Observer at IDM SA.  Trained in the USA, UK, Germany, and Switzerland Dr. Beil received a Ph.D. in molecular biology with distinction from the National Research Center for Biotechnology in Braunschweig, Germany.