Jean Derégnaucourt – Innovation Grant Jury President

Jean Derégnaucourt , D V M, Thesis Prize Winner, Graduate in  Pharmacology (Paris Medical Faculty), Post doctoral fellow at  University of California at Los Angeles (USA), is currently Vice President and Presidential Advisor at  Pierre Fabre Laboratories . As such, he is involved in strategic projects like establishing partnerships and developments in China. He is also Vice President of the Biotech company Cellvir which he cofounded 2 years ago.
His previous positions were Vice President Global Project Management then, Vice President Global Chemical and Pharmaceutical Development at Rhone Poulenc Rorer, now known as Sanofi- Aventis (1990-1998) and, lately, President of the Pierre Fabre Research Institute (1998-2003).
Thirty years in the pharmaceutical Industry at positions of growing responsibilities gave him the opportunity to know of many projects and to acquire a broad expertise in all aspects of the pharmaceutical R&D process. As such, Jean Derégnaucourt  contributed to the development and the international registration of a dozen of international products among them two blockbusters, namely, Clexane and Taxotere.
He then moved to an institutional position as Biotechnology Director at the French  Research  Ministery  (2003-2006).
In this later position Jean Derégnaucourt seated on the board of the Institut National de la Recherche Medicale (Inserm), of the Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA) and of the Institut National du Cancer (InCa) among other Institutes. He was also a member of the Haute Autorité de Santé (HAS) and of the Comité Economique des Produits de Santé (CEPS) and contributed also in establishing a European Network for public-private partnerships.
Through is dual career path, Jean Derégnaucourt benefited from the unique opportunity to gain exposure of both the private and the public sectors  and built a large expertise in the health field.

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Jean-Louis Dasseux, President and CEO - Cerenis Therapeutics

Jean-Louis Dasseux is a co-founder of Cerenis and is one of the world’s leading experts in lipid metabolism and lipid-protein interaction. Dr. Dasseux is the inventor of a high-capacity reverse lipid transport peptide (ETC-642) and a series of small molecule compounds that raise HDL levels. Dr. Dasseux was formerly vice president of chemistry and technology and chair of the ETC-642 development team at Esperion Therapeutics that led to the acquisition of the company by Pfizer. Before joining Esperion, he was director of research for the French pharmaceutical company Fournier, where he established and managed its research center in Heidelberg, Germany.

Ruxandra Draghia-Akli, European Commission

Ruxandra Draghia-Akli, MD, PhD served as the Vice President of Research at VGX Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Texas, USA. With 15 years of experience, she is recognized as a global leader in the field of DNA delivery for therapeutic and vaccination applications. Dr. Draghia-Akli also served as an ad hoc reviewer for granting agencies, such as European Union, USDA and NIH, annual meeting for gene therapy and endocrinology societies, and manuscripts for numerous journals.
Dr. Draghia-Akli received an M.D. from Carol Davilla Medical School and a Ph.D. in human genetics from Romanian Academy of Medical Sciences. She also completed a doctoral fellowship at the University of Rene Descartes in Paris and a post-doctoral training at Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, USA.

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Bernard Gilly, President and CEO - Fovea Pharmaceuticals

Bernard Gilly is Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer of Fovea, which he founded in 2005. He has been a Partner at Soffinova Partners from 2000 to 2005. He founded or invested in several companies, including Sequoia Pharmaceuticals (USA), Faust Pharmaceuticals (France) and Cellzone (Germany). Prior to joining Sofinnova, Bernard has been President and CEO of Transgene, a company he has driven from its early financing round in 1994 to its listing on the Nasdaq and the Nouveau Marche in March 1998, successfully raising a total of 160 M€. He was able to sign two key strategic partnerships with Schering-Plough and with Human Genome Sciences. Prior to joining Transgene, Bernard spent 6 years as VP R&D at Pasteur-Merieux-Connaught, the vaccine company that since then became Sanofi Pasteur. He was managing 1200 scientist and development engineers in three main facilities (France, USA and Canada) and was a member of the Executive Committee of the group.

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Pierre-Noël Lirsac – President of Adebiotech -  Deputy Director of the "Technologies pour la Santé" program (CEA)

Pierre-Noël LIRSAC, 45,  is Deputy Director of the technologies for health programme at the French Atomic Energy commission (CEA). He is also the present chairman of the Mirror Group and member of the Executive Board of the European Technology Plateform in Nanomedicine. Since January 2009 he also coordinates the EuroNanoMed ERA-Net initiative in Nanomedicine.

After A PhD in biochemistry, microbiology and bioconversion, PN Lirsac started as researcher in radiation biology. He was nominated at 30 as Head of laboratory at the life Science Directorate of the French atomic Energy Commission to develop new tools for protein structure studies by NMR using stable isotopes labelling techniques. From 1996 to 2002 and after period dedicated to prepare a studies on vaccines for the European commission, he was nominated  the Head of the Radiation protection, Biology and Medicine department of the National Institute for Sciences and Nuclear Technologies.

Early 2002 he joined the Directorate for Enterprises of the French Ministry of Industry as Head of the Biotech and Health Department. The mission was to elaborate an action plan for biotechnology and to support the attractiveness and competitiveness of the French environment for the French bio industry including innovation, R&D, regulatory, economic and fiscal aspects. Secretary of the French “Strategic Council for Health Industries” chaired by the Prime Minister since 2004, he also had the opportunity to initiate and chair (2005 to end 2006) the ERANET Eurotransbio.

Since End of 2006, he works at the Atomic Energy Commission as Deputy Director of the “Technology for health” programme. In june 2008 he was elected Chairman of "Adebiotech", the French association of biotechnology actors. "Adebiotech" is a think tank for large, small and medium companies, academic centres, scientific societies and governmental institutions in health, agro food, environment and industrial biotechnology.

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