Montreal, November 24, 2016 – Richard Fajzel, Chairman of the Board of Directors and Diane Gosselin, President and CEO of CQDM are very pleased to announce the appointment of two new members on the Board: Patrick Wier, Senior Vice President, In vitro/In vivo Translation Platform at GSK and Jorge Puente, co-founder and managing partner of Pleasanton Pharma Ventures. These two exceptional individuals bring a strong pharma perspective to the Board’s activities.
Patrick Wier has been working for GSK for more than 25 years. Prior to becoming Senior Vice President, In vitro/In vivo Translation Platform, he served as global head of nonclinical safety following his leadership of several component disciplines therein. His extensive pharma experience and insight, and latest translation platform responsibilities will be significant assets for CQDM’s continued activities.
Jorge Puente has had an extensive career in many areas of the pharmaceutical industry since joining 25 years ago. He served most recently as President of the Asia and Canada regions for Pfizer’s oncology unit and was simultaneously the head of Oncology Clinical Development for Pfizer in China. Mr. Puente brings strong leadership skills through his experience in research, drug development and knowledge of regulatory agencies. He is now the co-founder and managing partner of Pleasanton Pharma Ventures.
“On behalf of the Board of Directors, I am excited with the addition of Patrick Wier and Jorge Puente to our Board. Their unique experience and expertise in R&D and the pharmaceutical industry is highly complementary to that of our current members and will contribute towards supporting CQDM in its continued success,” said Richard Fajzel, Chief Executive Officer at Exactis Innovation and Chairman of CQDM’s Board of Directors.
These two new members add to an already impressive list of members of the Board:
Chairman – Richard Fajzel, Chief Executive Officer, Exactis Innovation
Jennifer Chan, Vice President, Policy and Communications, Merck Canada
Max Fehlmann, President and Chief Executive Officer, Neomed Institute
Michel Goldman, Director, Institute for Interdisciplinary Innovation in Healthcare, Université Libre de Bruxelles
Diane Gosselin, President and Chief Executive Officer, CQDM
Raphael Hofstein, President and Chief Executive Officer, MaRS Innovation
Vassilios Papadopoulos, Dean, John Stauffer Dean’s Chair in Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Southern California
Ken Pastor, General Partner, CTI Capital
Louise Proulx, Chief Development Officer, Therillia Development Company
Uwe Schoenbeck, Chief Scientific Officer, External Research & Development Innovation (ERDI), Pfizer
Ali Tehrani, Co-founder, President and CEO, Zymeworks
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
