Ajan Reginald is a biotechnology expert with experience in drug development, biotech transactions and drug commercialisation. Before taking the CEO position at Roquefort Therapeutics, Ajan Reginald was the Global Head of Emerging Technologies at the Roche Group (SWX: ROG) and the COO and Chief Technology Officer at Novacyt S.A (LON: NCYT) and co-founded Celixir.
An Overview of Roquefort Therapeutics:
Roquefort Therapeutics is a UK-based cancer-focused biotechnology company. The Company is led by Ajan Reginald, a leader experienced in drug development and commercialisation. the company has access to research on Midkine, a protein detected in cancer patients and those with immune and inflammatory disorders.
Ajan Reginald and Prof. Sir Martin Evans, the 2007 Nobel Laureate in Medicine developed a novel cardiac cellular medicine. The medicine passed pre-clinical development and met the FDA, MHRA and EU regulatory trial approvals. Together, they formed Celixir in 2009, licensed for the Japanese market with Daiichi Sankyo, a Japanese pharmaceutical company. Celixir is valued at £220 million.
He is an inventor of Celixir’s core technology, discovered Heartcel and Tendoncel and designed and led the early clinical trials.
Under Ajan’s leadership, the company has grown from 1 employee in 2009 to ~70 FTEs in EU, US and Asia and has completed five successful funding rounds. These rounds include crowd funding in 2014 and successful institutional funding rounds in 2016 and 2017.
In addition to this, Ajan led the negotiation and completion of Celixir’s partnership with Daiichi Sankyo (DS) in 2016 and Co-Chairs the DS-Celixir Joint Steering Committee.
Before Celixir, Ajan served as the Global Head of Emerging Technologies for Roche Group Research. Here, he was tasked with analysing and acquiring / partnering the next class of breakthrough medicines and innovative medical technologies.
Ajan began his career at Roche Pharma. Here, he partnered as a Business Development Director in the Pharma M&A group, leading the analysis and transaction teams for large strategic partnerships and acquisitions. In 2007, he was awarded the Roche Gold Olympiad for a $1.3B Alnylam transaction.
Ajan served as a consultant to Pharmaceutical clients in the US and Europe at the Boston Consulting Group, developing intellectual property strategy for clients in multiple industries.
Ajan is a Fulbright Scholar and alumni of Harvard Business School (AMP), University of Oxford (MSC, Experimental Therapeutics), Kellogg Business School (MBA) and London University (BDS).
After 5 years of retraining, Ajan also started the slow process of playing hockey again and started to coach junior players. He won European qualification with GH Zurich and the forelands leaguer in Germany. In 2007, Prof. Sir Martin Evans and Ajan both spoke at a conference in Hyderabad and started a friendship that led to their founding Cell Therapy Ltd (CTL) together in 2009.
Read more: https://colitco.com/roquefort-therapeutics-and-ceo-ajan-reginald-an-inspiring-story/