Team spirit is our key to success
The Versameb team consists of a number of senior experts in drug development and business building, complemented by a strong advisory team with research, clinical, technical and commercialization expertise.
Management Team
KLAAS ZUIDEVELD
CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER & MEMBER OF THE BOARD
Dr. Klaas Zuideveld brings over 20 years of drug development and life science industry experience to Versameb at a pivotal stage in the Company’s development as two of its lead assets transition from early discovery into clinical development. Klaas joined Versameb as Chief Development Officer in May 2020. Prior to this, Klaas has held leadership positions at Roche where amongst other things he has led the clinical development of Avastin™ (bevacizumab), and at Caris Life Sciences where he was responsible for the company’s first companion diagnostic partnership in oncology. He has further worked for and advised Mosaic Biomedicals (acquired by Northern Biologic), T3 Pharma, Envision Sciences, Therachon (acquired by Pfizer for $340 million upfront plus $470 million contingent payments) and Nucleai.
FRIEDRICH METZGER
CHIEF SCIENTIFIC OFFICER & CO-FOUNDER
Prof. Dr. Friedrich Metzger, a scientist and co-founder of Versameb, has an over 18 years’ experience in R&D both in pharma and biotech. Previously, Friedrich was Head of Discovery, Rare Diseases at Roche, Basel, where he was responsible for a portfolio of highly innovative development programs. He led preclinical activities for Evrysdi™ (risdiplam), a groundbreaking oral therapy for spinal muscular atrophy which was very recently approved. Friedrich is also Professor in Neurobiology at the University of Freiburg, Germany, and holds a PhD degree in pharmacology from the University of Tübingen, Germany.
ISABEL FERREIRA
CHIEF BUSINESS OFFICER
Dr. Isabel Ferreira joined Versameb in August 2019 as Chief Business Officer. Previously, she served Roche Partnering since 2015 as Director Global Business Development. In this role, she had broad responsibility across Pharma Business Development including strategy, search, evaluation, senior stakeholder management, leading cross-functional due diligence and negotiation teams to deal closure. Before joining Roche, Isabel served as Senior Director Business Development at Prosensa. During this time, she was instrumental in establishing transformative licensing transactions, supporting non-dilutive and private financing events, project management of Prosensa’s IPO launch at NASDAQ and supporting Prosensa’s acquisition by BioMarin. Earlier in her career, Isabel has been exposed to different aspects of the biopharmaceutical industry at Janssen-Cilag (Portugal), OctoPlus (The Netherlands) and Theravance (USA) in commercial, drug development and scientific roles. Isabel holds a Ph.D. in Biochemistry from the University of Groningen (The Netherlands) and an MBA from the Rotterdam School of Management (RSM), Erasmus University (The Netherlands).
Board of Directors
ALEXANDRE LEBEAUT
CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD
Dr. Alexandre LeBeaut has more than 25 years of experience and leadership both in innovation, research and development, from preclinical to post-marketing stage and with major achievements in particular in immunology, oncology, cardio-metabolic and infectious diseases. He has held various global positions, notably in the United States at Bluebird Bio, Sanofi, Novartis and Schering Plough Research Institute. Most recently, Alexandre LeBeaut served as Executive Vice-President R&D and Chief Scientific Officer at Ipsen in the US and as CEO at the Institute for Advanced Clinical Trials for Children. He is a member of the Board of Calypso Biotech (Geneva, Switzerland) and OSE Immunotherapeutics (Paris, France).
BETTINA ERNST
MEMBER OF THE BOARD
Dr. Bettina Ernst has been investing in healthcare companies for the past 6 years. She also serves on the board of several early-stage biotech companies in Switzerland, on the board of the Swiss Biotech Association, and as a member of the advisory board of the Swiss Entrepreneur Fund and of the Innovation Council of Innosuisse. Bettina is a co-founder of two biotech companies. Prior to her investment and entrepreneurial activities, she worked for 10 years in fundamental immunology in the US (Scripps Research Institute, San Diego, CA) and in Europe. Bettina holds a PhD in immunology and an undergraduate degree in natural science from the Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich. Bettina resides in Switzerland.
LILY GEIDELBERG
MEMBER OF THE BOARD
Dr Lily Geidelberg is Senior Biotechnology Analyst at Brevan Howard. She recommends compelling biopharma opportunities in the public markets, combining both domain expertise with macroeconomic analysis. She also advises on private biotech opportunities. Prior to joining Brevan Howard, she completed her PhD at Imperial College London in mathematical modelling of infectious disease epidemics, having published several publications in leading journals. She is an independent board member of eureKING, a SPAC aiming to be the foremost European CDMO.
PAUL KORNER
MEMBER OF THE BOARD
Paul Korner, MD, MBA is a board-certified obstetrician & gynecologist physician executive with over 24 years of pharmaceutical/biotech industry experience, previously serving in senior R&D leadership positions for Ferring Pharmaceuticals, Ardelyx Inc., Sarepta Therapeutics and Axovant Gene Therapies. He is currently the Chief Medical Officer of Agile Therapeutics, Inc. He has been responsible for multiple INDs/CTAs and more than 50 clinical trials (phase 1-4), leading to marketing authorization/approvals of 10 products including VYONDYS 53® (golodirsen) and several others. While serving as SVP Clinical & Medical Affairs at Axovant Gene Therapies, he advanced two gene therapy programs into IND and BLA enabling clinical trials for GM1 and GM2 gangliosidosis. He has been part of the Laidlaw Venture Partners team for more than 3 years, providing strategic and operational scientific/clinical guidance to portfolio companies and serving on the Board of Directors for Voltron Therapeutics.
HERNAN LEVETT
MEMBER OF THE BOARD
Hernan Levett serves as CFO of Spexis Ltd. (formerly Polyphor). He joined Spexis/Polyphor from NASDAQ listed company Auris Medical where he also served as CFO. He started his international Pharma career at Novartis where he held roles of increasing responsibility in various countries and regional functions and as CFO for one of its affiliates. Following a 10-year tenure at Novartis, Mr Levett continued to build his experience in biotech joining InterMune where he served as VP of Finance. Mr. Levett brings over 25 years of finance and pharma / biotech experience at leading companies and holds a CPA degree from the University of Buenos Aires, Faculty of Economics.
EUGENE TIERNEY
MEMBER OF THE BOARD
Eugene Tierney is an experienced business strategist and has held senior positions across the whole pharma value chain. He spent several years as head of global pharma business strategy with Roche, before becoming Therapeutic Area Head for Anti-infectives & Transplantation. He was later appointed Head of Neuroscience, with accountability for all aspects of discovery and early development, as well as commercialisation. He currently works as a consultant to pharma and biotech companies and is a non-executive director on the boards of a number of privately owned biotech companies.
