Adrian Dawkes talks to PharmaVentures Founder and CEO Fintan Walton about how companies can navigate risk and even deploy new strategies in times of increased uncertainty. With the threat of tariffs, a global trade war and unease in the financial markets this podcast explores the ways companies can gain advantage over their competitors and survive when geo-politics and high levels of volatility in the financial markets throws chaos and uncertainty into strategies adopted and deployed in more normal times.

Fintan Walton, founder and CEO of PharmaVentures chairs a round table discussion on this pressing issue.

Featuring;

Jim Gale. Managing Partner, Signet Healthcare Partners. A New York based Private equity firm with a wide portfolio including API medchem, Pharma Services and CDMO businesses.

Andreas Raabe: Founder & CEO of Adragos Pharma, a CDMO manufacturing in the EU and Japan.

Frank Dollard: 45 years of experience in pharmaceutical manufacturing, including GSK, BMS and Teva.

Soren Demin: Managing Director & Head of M&A at PharmaVentures and formerly senior commercial positions in multiple pharma business and a qualified medical practitioner.

In a wide-ranging discussion, hear the panelist's views on;

Adrian Dawkes talks to PharmaVentures Founder and CEO Fintan Walton about his experience from over 30 years of dealmaking. In particular, why innovator biotechs and their investors are weaker when they underestimate the significance of both understanding and communicating their commercial strategy for their lead assets in negotiations.

Hear about:

• Failing to understand the inherent risks at the commercial stage is a failure of investment logic.

Listen as Adrian Dawkes talks to Kurt Herpel, CEO and Klaus Kratochwill, CSO of Delta 4, an Austrian /Swiss based AI tech company. Hear how their AI journey began more than 20 years ago and how the company developed into a key player in AI drug discovery. Hear how their clients are already benefiting from AI. You will hear their insights into;

• Where AI is benefiting drug discovery processes today?

To find out what the diagnostics deal making landscape looks like for you, you can request an initial complimentary consultation with the experts in this podcast via email: [email protected]

About the Presenter:

Adrian Dawkes is a Managing Director at PharmaVentures and has been with the company since 2007. Adrian has led multiple consultancy, licensing and M&A mandates.

During his professional career, .Adrian has significant multi-discipline expertise spanning research and development through to sales, marketing and business development. Adrian has over 30 years' experience in the pharmaceutical, biotechnology and consultancy services sectors. Adrian holds a BSc in Biochemistry and a PhD in Immunochemistry

Listen as Soren Demin draws on his 20 years of M&A experience to provide insight into the current Pharma/Biotech M&A landscape. Key topics include;

• Is the M&A landscape recovering and will we see record activity again?

To find out what the diagnostics deal making landscape looks like for you, you can request an initial complimentary consultation with the experts in this podcast via email: [email protected]

About the Interviewees:

Soren Demin is a Managing Director at PharmaVentures, where he excels in creating and unlocking value for clients through M&A, business development, and licensing. He joined PharmaVentures in 2024, bringing over 15 years of global experience in the biopharma industry.

Soren’s successful industry and investment banking career, combined with his advisory and medical background, is crucial for understanding clients’ needs and providing optimized solutions.

Before this role, Soren served as Chief Business Officer at the private equity-backed Essential Pharma. He also held the position of Commercial Director at the UK government’s biological manufacturing unit, Porton BioPharma, where he established new strategic collaborations and directed product development and manufacturing. Previously, Soren was part of Mitsubishi Tanabe and the Piramal Group

Soren began his M&A career at Goldman Sachs, focusing on cross-border deal origination across the US, MENA, Europe, and Asia, before which he studied for a Bachelor of Medicine at the University of Sheffield and a PhD in Biotechnology from the University of Cambridge.

About the Presenter:

Adrian Dawkes is a Managing Director at PharmaVentures and has been with the company since 2007. Adrian has led multiple consultancy, licensing and M&A mandates.

During his professional career, Adrian has significant multi-discipline expertise spanning research and development through to sales, marketing and business development. Adrian has over 30 years' experience in the pharmaceutical, biotechnology and consultancy services sectors. Adrian holds a BSc in Biochemistry and a PhD in Immunochemistry.

Listen as Andreas Katsiamides talks with Adrian Dawkes about the future of diagnostics and the impact on deals. They discuss:

• Technological advances in diagnostics, such as artificial intelligence (AI), next-generation sequencing (NGS) and polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing

To find out what the diagnostics deal making landscape looks like for you, you can request an initial complimentary consultation with the experts in this podcast via email: [email protected]

About the Interviewee:

Andreas Katsiamides is an Associate at PharmaVentures.

He has experience in Molecular Biology and Medical Diagnostics. Prior to joining PharmaVentures, Andreas worked in competitive intelligence consulting firms, supporting with commercial/competitor due diligence and opportunity and threat assessments across a range of therapy areas including oncology, personalised healthcare, and infectious and rare diseases.

Andreas holds a BSc in Molecular Genetics and Pharmacology and a PhD in Molecular Neurobiology, both from the University of King’s College London (UK).

About the Presenter:

Adrian Dawkes is a Managing Director at PharmaVentures and has been with the company since 2007. Adrian has led multiple consultancy, licensing and M&A mandates.

During his professional career, Adrian has significant multi-discipline expertise spanning research and development through to sales, marketing and business development. Adrian has over 30 years’ experience in the pharmaceutical, biotechnology and consultancy services sectors. Adrian holds a BSc in Biochemistry and a PhD in Immunochemistry.

Listen as Colin McCall, Partner - Life Sciences and Deep Tech at Taylor Wessing, and Oliver Pumfrey, Managing Director at FTI Consulting, talk with Adrian Dawkes about law and tax during the licensing and M&A deal making process. They discuss a range of topics where different advisors use their expertise to help you achieve the best deal and avoid pitfalls in the future:

• The deal stages when expert advice can save you time and money.

About the Interviewees:

Colin McCall is a partner in Taylor Wessing's market leading life sciences team and is one of the UK's leading life sciences licensing and commercialisation lawyers having more than 20 years’ experience of acting almost exclusively in the sector.

He advises clients throughout their lifecycle (all the way from start-up/spin-out to multinational listed companies) on the commercialisation of their intellectual property rights. In particular, advising on licensing deals, collaborations and R&D projects, distribution and manufacturing arrangements and has a particular focus on the biotech sector with a strong therapeutics, synbio and agbio client following. 

Colin has a 1st class degree in cell biology and a masters in environmental technology.  Colin also sits on the BIA's Engineering Biology Advisory Committee

Oliver Pumfrey is a Managing Director at FTI Consulting. He manages the Life Sciences Tax team and is based in London.

Oliver has over 17 years’ experience but prior to joining FTI Consulting, he worked in an industry where he was responsible for all taxes across the EMEA region for a multinational US-listed group. Prior to that, Oliver spent 10 years with PWC, working across a number of tax areas including corporate tax, employment taxes and the tax technical knowledge team.

Having joined FTI Consulting in 2016, Oliver supports Life Sciences clients across a range of tax matters including R&D incentive claims for large enterprises and SMEs and related transactional advice and planning. He also advises on the Enterprise Investment Scheme, licensing of intellectual property rights and Patent Box elections in regard to optimal timing and the potential benefits.

Oliver holds a BSc (Hons) in Biochemistry from Imperial College, London and is an Associate of the Royal College of Science. He qualified as a Chartered Accountant (ACA) in 2010 and became a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales in 2020.

About the Presenter:

Adrian Dawkes is a Managing Director at PharmaVentures and has been with the company since 2007. Adrian has led multiple consultancy, licensing and M&A mandates.

During his professional career, Adrian has significant multi-discipline expertise spanning research and development through to sales, marketing and business development. Adrian has over 30 years’ experience in the pharmaceutical, biotechnology and consultancy services sectors. Adrian holds a BSc in Biochemistry and a PhD in Immunochemistry.

Once you have identified an asset you want to acquire or partner, what happens next?

In this podcast, Ralph Hughes takes the listener through the process of commercial due diligence and evaluation, including the key stakeholders and insights needed to understand whether the asset is going to achieve strong performance in the marketplace.

Ralph talks to Adrian Dawkes about the different components involved in pre- and full- commercial due diligence:

 - Understanding KOLs and payer perspectives to help you define market positioning and pricing.

 - Getting the right subject matter expertise.

 - The importance of a robust forecast and valuation on which to base the commercial launch strategy.

 - How best to communicate data to reduce uncertainty and risk.

 - Overcoming the challenges of getting in-depth due diligence done quickly.

About the Interviewee:

Ralph Hughes is a Vice President at PharmaVentures with experience in Pricing and Market Access and Commercial and Business Development.

He has held various roles in the pharmaceutical industry. For Mundipharma, he developed the commercial and market access strategy for development and launch assets. At Pfizer, he developed market access and pricing strategies across the globe and across multiple disease areas for both early, late stage and in-market assets. He has delivered marketing campaigns, global forecasts, HTAs, pricing strategies, real world data studies, and economic models; through this, Ralph has a deep understanding of what it takes to commercialise an asset in the pharmaceutical industry. He holds a MSc in Public Health and Health Economics from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and a BSc in Biomedical Sciences from Newcastle.

About the Presenter:

Adrian Dawkes is a Managing Director at PharmaVentures and has been with the company since 2007. Adrian has led multiple consultancy, licensing and M&A mandates.

During his professional career, Adrian has significant multi-discipline expertise spanning research and development through to sales, marketing and business development. Adrian has over 30 years’ experience in the pharmaceutical, biotechnology and consultancy services sectors. Adrian holds a BSc in Biochemistry and a PhD in Immunochemistry.

Listen as Andrew Guise gives key insight into the deal making landscape - asset value, accessing the market, positioning and the actual deal process in the current economic climate - from the unique position standing astride both the financial world and the technical world translating science into value.

About the Interviewee:

Andrew Guise is a Managing Director at PharmaVentures and is a member of the Corporate Advisory Team.

Andrew is a highly accomplished executive with a wealth of experience in finance, business development, and leadership. Notable deals including IPOs for IsoTis, Genmab and Thrombogenics, secondaries for Serono ($4bn), divestments of, St Martins Healthcare (hospitals), Degussa Dental, Synthes Stratec (ortho), Plasso to Becton Dickenson (lab supply), Oxxon to Oxford Bio (immunotherapy), Surface Therapeutics to Serentis (dermatology), Zyentia to Lonza (protein refolding). Andrew has held Board positions at Oxford Biosensors (POC diag), Oxitec (pest control), Prolysis (anti -infectives), Purity Health (reformulation), and Gaia Biotherapeutics (cannabinoids).

During his professional career Andrew has acted as advisor (SME to FTSE 100), VC investor, and held Board / C suite roles in a number of life science companies across multiple sectors.  Andrew has over 30 years’ experience in all areas of healthcare. Andrew holds a BEng in Biochemical Engineering and a PhD in Protein Refolding.

About the Presenter:

Adrian Dawkes is a Managing Director at PharmaVentures and has been with the company since 2007. Adrian has led multiple consultancy, licensing and M&A mandates.

During his professional career, Adrian has significant multi-discipline expertise spanning research and development through to sales, marketing and business development. Adrian has over 30 years’ experience in the pharmaceutical, biotechnology and consultancy services sectors. Adrian holds a BSc in Biochemistry and a PhD in Immunochemistry.

Listen as Jansen Jacob, Frank Dollard and Steve Garland discuss the ways in which pharma and biotech companies are getting control back over their supply chain and the opportunities they are seeing from best practice;  how the importance of quality and efficiency, including moves towards new low-cost regions in the West, are reducing risk for manufacturers whilst governments are trying to squeeze costs to meet the needs of a larger proportion of people requiring more medicines. 

About the Interviewees:

Jansen Jacob is a Vice President at PharmaVentures.

Jansen is a healthcare transactions professional with nearly 20 years in the life science sector with expertise in M&A, licensing, business strategy, commercial due-diligence and deal structuring. At PharmaVentures, Jansen has played a key role in the divestment of manufacturing and R&D businesses on behalf of top 10 large pharmaceutical companies, resulting in multi-million dollar deals. Over the years he has also worked on a diverse range of assignments including licensing, valuation and strategy projects.

Frank Dollard is a Senior Advisor at PharmaVentures.

Frank has a 40-year track-record of success and innovation in the Pharmaceutical Industry working for Glaxo, BMS and Pliva. His main experiences cover Manufacturing, Quality Management, Commercial, Supply-Chain and Procurement (Strategic Sourcing) within the ethical & generic pharmaceutical and devices industry. He has formed and led teams in Europe/USA/Latin America and the Pacific Rim. Frank is a chemistry graduate from the University of Liverpool. Since joining PharmaVentures, Frank has opined on multiple divestment projects, including the recent sale of Novartis’ manufacturing plants to Siegfried.

Steve Garland is an Expert Advisor at PharmaVentures.

With over 35 years’ experience in the biologics industry Steve’s career has covered the manufacturing, process development, business development and general management of vaccine (human and animal), recombinant proteins, monoclonal antibodies and cell and gene therapy product supply.  Steve has worked in both the CDMO and multi-product organisations and has extensive experience of microbial, yeast and mammalian cell culture systems ranging from less than 500mL to 12,000L scale using single use disposable and purpose designed and built stainless steel equipment.

A microbiologist by education Steve has lived and worked in the Netherlands.  He has led technology transfer projects into, out of and within the UK, has worked as a process expert on facility design and build within and without of the UK and has been process/facility lead on several M&A assignments.

About the Presenter:

Adrian Dawkes is a Managing Director at PharmaVentures and has been with the company since 2007. Adrian has led multiple consultancy, licensing and M&A mandates.

During his professional career, Adrian has significant multi-discipline expertise spanning research and development through to sales, marketing and business development. Adrian has over 30 years’ experience in the pharmaceutical, biotechnology and consultancy services sectors. Adrian holds a BSc in Biochemistry and a PhD in Immunochemistry.