Best Startup
At Best Startup UK we track over 130,000 UK startups and over 500,000 people who hold key positions in these companies. We use this directory of startups to highlight top employees, founders and board members we think deserve more appreciation than they are currently getting.
This list showcases the top Oxford based CEO’ operating in the Pharmaceutical space. If you think a CEO’ is missing from this list, feel free to contact our editor on editor@beststartup.co.uk.
The individuals on this list have been included because of exceptional performance in one of the following categories:
- Innovation – Operating as a key part in an extremely innovative business or startup.
- Growth – Operating as a key figure in the growth and upscale of a market leading business or startup.
- Management – Showing exceptional management skills.
- Societal impact – Putting their business on the map for their positive societal or environmental impact.
Our Data – We source our data from OSINT (open source intelligence) and public directories such as Companies House UK, Crunchbase, SemRush and many more. The data from these sources should be treated with a degree of caution and verified yourself.
Tony de Fougerolles
Chief Executive Officer of Evox Therapeutics
Tony has been CEO of Evox Therapeutics since late 2017. He has 25 years of biotech R&D experience and has played a key role in developing and advancing three new drug modalities towards the market (mRNA, RNAi, Nanobodies). Previously, Tony was CSO of Ablynx, where he led the company’s non-clinical R&D operations and helped bring the 1st Nanobody drug, caplacizumab, to approval. Prior to Ablynx, Tony was the founding CSO at Moderna and pioneered modified mRNA as a new therapeutic modality for both rare diseases and as vaccines, including being the inventor of the mRNA chemistry and the foundational LNP formulations used in both the approved Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech covid-19 vaccines. Prior to Moderna, Tony was among the first 6 employees at Alnylam and as VP Research helped develop RNAi as a new therapeutic modality, including overseeing the development of the now 1st approved LNP RNAi delivery system, and contributing to the development of several now approved RNAi drugs to treat life-threatening diseases. Tony has raised over $150m in equity financing, been the author on over $80m in grants, has over 60 scientific publications, and is an inventor on over 100 issued U.S. patents. He also serves on the Board of Walking Fish Therapeutics, is an advisor to and investor in multiple biotech companies, and is a Venture Partner at Ascension, a London-based venture capital firm. Lastly, he also volunteers his time with several non-profit organisations and charities. He earned his PhD in Immunology from Harvard University.
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About Evox Therapeutics: Evox Therapeutics is a biotechnology company that harnesses and engineer the natural trafficking capabilities of extracellular vesicles.
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Ian Nicholson
Chief Executive Officer of F2G
Ian joined Advent in 2012 from Chroma Therapeutics Limited, a privately held oncology-focussed R&D company, where he served as Chief Executive Officer for eight years. Prior to joining Chroma, Ian was Senior Vice President, Business Development at Celltech Group plc, then the UK’s largest biotechnology company. He has extensive experience in licensing, mergers and acquisitions, and market development in the UK, Europe and the US. Ian has held a variety of senior commercial positions with Oxford Asymmetry International plc, Lonza AG and Amersham International plc and currently sits on the Boards of Consort Medical plc, Clinigen Group plc and is Non-Executive Chairman of Bioventix plc. Ian holds a B.Sc. (Hons.) degree from University College London and an MBA from Boston University. Ian is CEO of F2G Ltd and an advisor to NeRRe Therapeutics.
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About Advent Life Sciences, Amersham International, F2G: F2G discovers and develops novel drugs for the treatment of life-threatening fungal diseases.
Andrew Hopkins
Co-Founder and CEO of Exscientia
Andrew spent 10 years at Pfizer, where he was responsible for establishing new research foci including the concepts of druggability and network pharmacology. Andrew has raised a total of $50 million for academic and commercial research activities in his continuing role as Chair of Medicinal Informatics at the University of Dundee. He is the author of some of the most highly cited papers in modern drug discovery.
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About Exscientia, Kinetic Discovery Ltd.: Exscientia is a pharmatech company that uses an end-to-end AI platform to design and discover new drugs.
Soren Krogsgaard Thomsen
Co-Founder, CEO and Managing Director of BioMe Oxford
Soren is a medical scientist at the University of Oxford, with a background in the natural sciences and genetics research. He previously worked as a consultant for pharma and OBR consulting, and has published on his experiences as an academic entrepreneur. Soren’s current research is focused on translating large-scale genetic data into mechanisms for disease to inform new therapeutic strategies. He dreams of one day enabling similar population-wide microbiome studies using the platform technology under development at BioMe Oxford Ltd.
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About BioMe Oxford, Vertex Pharmaceuticals: Unlocking your gut microbiome by developing a medical device for targeted and non-invasive sampling
Martin-Immanuel Bittner
Co-Founder & CEO of Arctoris
Martin-Immanuel Bittner MD DPhil is a clinician-scientist and life sciences entrepreneur. He is a Rhodes scholar, an active member of several leading cancer research organisations, and an elected member of the Young Academy of the German National Academy of Sciences. Martin is a Co-Founder & CEO of Arctoris, the world’s first fully automated drug discovery platform.
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About Arctoris: Arctoris is a tech-enabled platform company in biotechnology, combining robotics & data science to accelerate drug discovery.
Eliot Forster
CEO of F-star Therapeutics
Eliot Forster is Chief Executive Officer at F-star Therapeutics.
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About F-star Therapeutics: F-star is developing a pipeline of novel bispecific antibodies with a therapeutic focus in immuno-oncology and oncology.
Mark Larkin
CEO and Founder of Vitaccess
Mark Larkin founded Vitaccess in 2017, after more than 15 years in consultancy, with the aims of harnessing the power of digital technology to better represent the voice of patients in drug development and market access. Mark has a BA, MA and PhD from the University of Cambridge, UK.
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About Vitaccess: Digital healthcare company providing biopharma clients with real-time insights into patients’ lives via innovative global studies
Michael Hunter
CEO Designate of Viatem
Michael Hunter is a Co-Founder & CEO at Orca Pharmaceuticals.
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About Orca Pharmaceuticals, Viatem: Viatem is an University of Birmingham Spinout company working to exploit the therapeutic potential of PEPITEM.
