Montreal, September 19, 2016 – The Chairman of CQDM’s Board of Directors, Richard Fajzel and Diane Gosselin, President and CEO of CQDM are pleased to announce the appointment of Ali Tehrani, Co-founder, President and CEO of Zymeworks, and audacious entrepreneur, as new member of the Board.
Ali Tehrani is well known in Canada and internationally for his business acumen and professional accomplishments including nothing less than revolutionizing the world of biotech companies in Canada. As President and CEO of Zymeworks, selected as the Company of the Year by BIOTECanada in 2016, and separately by LifeSciences British Columbia, he has designed a unique and hybrid business model based on strategic corporate collaborations with partners instead of competing with them. With Dr. Tehrani’s extensive network and instinctive leadership, Zymeworks is being recognized for its ongoing accomplishments in its early-stage oncology biotherapeutics pipeline. Zymeworks uses its knowledge to develop and license bispecific antibody therapeutics and platforms with the finality to bring innovative therapies into clinical development. Ali Tehrani reinvents drug development while creating sustainable growth for the Canadian biotechnology sector.
“I am honoured to be given the opportunity to contribute to the mission and objectives of CQDM.I believe the leadership team and the organization as a whole is well positioned to be key contributor to the Biotechnology ecosystem in Canada,” said Ali Tehrani, Co-founder, President and CEO of Zymeworks.
“The members of CQDM’s Board of Directors are very pleased to welcome Ali Tehrani. Dr. Tehrani’s experience and skills in drug development and start-up financing are highly relevant and we look forward to working with him in supporting CQDM in its continued evolution to support open innovation initiatives that are critical to the discovery of breakthrough technologies,” said Richard Fajzel, Chairman of CQDM’s Board of Directors.
“It is with great enthusiasm that I welcome Ali on our Board of Directors. Ali’s leadership skills and creativity are revolutionizing the way to innovate in Canada. His success in building a world leading Canadian biotech company and his commitment to the overall ecosystem will bring value to CQDM’s activities and I am truly looking forward to working with him,” said Diane Gosselin, President and CEO of CQDM.
About CQDM
CQDM is a pharma-based consortium active in biopharmaceutical research whose mission is to fund the development of innovative tools and technologies to accelerate drug discovery. Unique in the world, CQDM’s business model is based on a collaborative approach where all stakeholders share the costs of biopharmaceutical research and benefit from its results. CQDM also provides a common meeting ground where academia, governments, biotechs and the pharmaceutical industry converge to address numerous complex medical challenges. CQDM receives financial support from Merck, Pfizer Inc., AstraZeneca, Boehringer Ingelheim, GlaxoSmithKline, Eli Lilly Canada, Janssen, Novartis Pharma Canada, Sanofi Canada, as well as from Quebec’s Ministry of Economy, Science and Innovation (MESI) and from the Government of Canada under the Business-Led Networks of Centres of Excellence Program (BL-NCE). For more information: www.cqdm.org.
Contact:
Eugénie Bergeron-Côté
Communications Advisor, CQDM
Phone: 514-766-6661, ext. 2196
ebergeron@cqdm.org
www.cqdm.org
