About the Authors
Over the years, we have had the opportunity to speak to students in science, engineering, business, and even the humanities at Princeton, Oxford, Cambridge, Notre Dame, and other universities. These students have been interested in learning more about entrepreneurship and biotechnology not only from an academic perspective, but also as a potential career direction. In many respects, this book represents the extended version of those talks we have given – our sense of what someone entering the industry might want to know. At the same time, we have tried to analyze the industry, especially as to the origins of important new medicines, in a number of ways that we believe may provide insights for both practitioners and scholars into how the business of drug development has changed over the last half century.
Have a question or interested in arranging a book talk? Contact the authors.
“ A key objective, and in fact, driving force, when we set out to write this book was to bring together the complex reality of running a biotech company with the insights offered by the academic literature on the topic. ”
Donald Drakeman
Donald Drakeman, PhD, was the founding CEO of the US biotech company that pioneered the development of the checkpoint inhibitor cancer treatments recognized in the Nobel Prize for Medicine 2018. These products, YERVOY and OPDIVO, are being used to treat many different forms of cancer. He is a Fellow in Operations and Technology Management at the Cambridge Judge Business School, Distinguished Research Professor in the Center for Citizenship and Constitutional Government at the University of Notre Dame, and a Venture Partner at Advent Life Sciences. His publications have been cited in numerous patents and by the Supreme Court of the United States. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology. A graduate of Columbia Law School, he received a PhD from Princeton University.
Read the Excerpt Don Selected: Monoclonal Antibodies
Lisa Drakeman
Lisa Drakeman, PhD, was the founding CEO of one of Europe’s most successful biotechnology companies. Under her leadership, the company set numerous financing records, including a record setting IPO, and inaugurated research programs leading to the new FDA-approved medicines DARZALEX (multiple myeloma) and KESIMPTA (multiple sclerosis). She is a Fellow of the Centre for Health Leadership and Enterprise at the Judge Business School, University of Cambridge, and Vice Chair of the board of the Zucker Institute for Innovation Commercialization at the Medical University of South Carolina. She has received numerous industry honors, including the Sol J. Barer Award for Vision, Innovation, and Leadership. She has been a faculty member at Princeton University and regularly lectures on entrepreneurship at universities in the US and Europe. She received a PhD from Princeton University.
Read the Excerpt Lisa Selected: Are You an Entrepreneur?
Nektarios Oraiopoulos
Nektarios Oraiopoulos, PhD, is a Professor of Operations and Technology Management at the Cambridge Judge Business School of the University of Cambridge. His research on innovation and R&D management has appeared in the leading journals of the field. He has won multiple awards and has been invited to make presentations at both academic and industry conferences. In addition to his academic work, he has advised entrepreneurial start-ups and has worked closely on research projects with numerous executives from the biopharmaceutical industry. He holds a Diploma in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens, Greece, and a PhD in Business Administration from the Georgia Institute of Technology.
Read the Excerpt Nektarios Selected: Biotech-Pharma Alliances