Ulrich Granzer, Ph.D.

Dr. Ulrich Granzer, Ph.D. is working as an independent consultant for drug development and regulatory affairs. In January 2002, he set up his own consultancy company. He is focusing on all aspects of drug development and has major experience in drug development and regulatory affairs of biotech products and small molecules. After finishing his Ph.D. in pharmaceutical chemistry Dr. Granzer started his industry career at Glaxo where he held the position head of regulatory affairs. After leaving Glaxo Wellcome he joined BASF pharma Knoll, where he took over responsibility as Head of global regulatory centers, which comprised regulatory affairs, drug safety, and GXP. At Knoll he worked on the development of several biological compounds directed against the sequelae of stroke, septic shock, and rheumatoid arthritis, where he had major involvement into the program for the first fully human anti TNF antibody, now marketed as Humira. After Knoll was taken over by Abbott, he joined Bayer as VP, global regulatory affairs, where he stayed until he founded his own company. He has a track record of working on more than 100 NME’s and MNE.

Prof. Hans Hengartner, Ph.D.

Prof. Hans Hengartner is an expert in immunology, and was awarded the Ernst-Jung-Prize for Medicine and the Otto-Naegeli-Prize in 1997, for his work on the perforin molecule. Prof. Hengartner holds a joined professorship in Immunology from the University Zurich and the ETH Zurich. He has been in charge of the Institute of Experimental Immunology together with Prof. Zinkernagel for more than 20 years, and in January 2000 he became Dean of the Department of Biology of the ETH Zurich.

Prof. Christoph Huber, M.D.

Prof. Christoph Huber is an expert in tumor immunology, gene therapy of malignant diseases and stem cell transplantation. He is Head of the department of Hematology and Oncology at the Johannes Gutenberg University Medical School in Mainz and is the founder and Director of the University's Tumor Vaccination Center. The pivotal trials for therapeutic antibodies such as Mylotarg®, Rituxan®, and others were conducted at Professor Huber's centre as were pivotal studies for selective cancer compounds such as Gleevec®. Additionally, under his supervision, a Novartis professorship for translational signal transduction research is being established at this institution.

Prof. Rolf Zinkernagel, M.D.

Prof. Rolf Zinkernagel is an expert in immunology, and was awarded the Nobel-Prize for Medicine and Physiology in 1996 for his discovery of "MHC restriction". Since 1980, Prof. Zinkernagel has been heading the Institute of Experimental Immunology together with Prof. Hans Hengartner at the University of Zurich, Switzerland. He is a member of the executive board of Novartis and is engaged in promoting several young Swiss and European biotechnology companies.