Novacta's Board of Directors
Andrew Richards, Chairman
Dr Andy Richards is a serial entrepreneur and business angel. He has invested in more than 25 private companies and has played an active role in many of these. He is currently Chairman of Altacor, Ixico and Novacta and is a director of Vectura plc, Summit plc, Theradeas, Cancer Research Technology (commercial arm of CR-UK) and Babraham Bioscience Technology.
Andy is a Cambridge University natural sciences graduate and has a PhD in Protein Chemistry. He spent his early career in research with ICI (now AstraZeneca) and consulting with PA Technology. He was a founder of Chiroscience in 1992 and an executive director through to the sale to Celltech in 1999. Since that time he has been founding and investing in new lifescience companies including several of those listed above as well as Arakis, Geneservice, Cambridge Biotechnology Ltd, Amedis Pharmaceuticals, Sirus Pharmaceuticals Daniolabs and Pharmakodex, all of which were recently sold. He is a member of the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), a founder member of the Cambridge Angels, the founding Chairman of BIA Bioangels and an advisor to Toscana Life Sciences. He also advises a number of leading venture capital and private equity funds.
Tony Sedgwick, CEO
Tony's career has covered a range of entrepreneurial roles in the biotech and pharmaceutical industries. In 2005, Tony was appointed Chief Executive of DanioLabs Ltd, a Cambridge University spin-out. Under Tony's leadership DanioLabs became a neurology/ ophthalmology-focussed pharmaceutical reprofiling company. DanioLabs was acquired by Summit plc in March 2007 for £15 million. From 2002 to 2005, Tony was Chief Executive of Cambridge Biotechnology Ltd ("CBT"), a Parke Davis/Cambridge University spin-out. CBT developed a portfolio of product candidates in the areas of pain, obesity and inflammation. In March 2005, CBT was acquired by Biovitrum AB of Stockholm, and continues to operate as an autonomous business unit on the Babraham Research Campus in Cambridge. Prior to his move into biotechnology, Tony had a long and successful clinical development career at Roche, where has was Global Head of Clinical Operations and UK Development Director.
Mike Dawson, CSO
Mike studied Natural Sciences at Cambridge and has a PhD in microbial biochemistry (Leicester). Prior to co-founding Novacta Mike spent 20 years in the pharmaceutical industry with GlaxoSmithKline and legacy companies. In his role as Head of the Biotransformations and Natural Product Chemistry teams, he was a co-inventor of important series of natural products, such as the sordarins and squalestatins. He also led the development of biotransformation processes used in the manufacture of important drugs such as epivir, abacavir and zanamavir.
Myra Waiman, Non-Executive Director
Myra is an experienced strategy and business consultant. She established Romney Consultants in 1996 and clients include Rosetta Genomics, Biondvax, Evogene, Healthcare Enterprise Group and Medivet Veterinary Group. Myra is also a director of Westgate Hall plc, a private, early stage venture capital investment group. Myra has a BSc in Botany & Timber technology (Imperial College) and an MA in Modern History
David Pompliano Non-Executive Director
David L. Pompliano is the Principal at Sanderling Consulting LLC, where he assists investors, companies and philanthropies in the evaluation of pharmaceutical assets and in the process of drug discovery and development. After graduating with honors in chemistry from the University of Virginia, he earned the PhD in bioorganic chemistry at Stanford University with John Frost. He completed his training at Harvard University as an NIH postdoctoral fellow in enzymology and molecular biology with Jeremy Knowles. His career in the pharmaceutical industry began in 1990 at Merck Research Laboratories, where he first worked on signaling pathways relevant to cancer before taking on the leadership of target-based approaches to antibacterial drug discovery. In 1999, he joined DuPont Pharma as Executive Director of antimicrobial research. Then in 2002, he was appointed Vice President of biology for the Microbial Musculoskeletal and Proliferative Diseases Center for Excellence in Drug Discover at GlaxoSmithKline. Pompliano led a group of >200 biological scientists who, in collaboration with medicinal chemists, generated more than 25 medicine development candidates for infectious diseases (including diseases of the developing world), cancer and musculoskeletal diseases. Pompliano joined Merck Research Labs in 2007 as Worldwide Basic Head in the Vaccines and Infectious Diseases Franchise, where he was responsible for the antimicrobial discovery and early development strategy. He formed Sanderling Consulting LLC in 2009. He has published over 50 research papers on topics in antimicrobials and cancer, and has given more than 30 invited lectures internationally. He holds three patents for novel methods in drug discovery.
