Board of Directors

Dr Jane Griffiths

Chair

Former Global Head of Actelion

Jane Griffiths has enjoyed a long and successful career in the pharmaceutical sector at Johnson & Johnson. During her tenure there she held executive roles in clinical research, international and strategic marketing, product management and operational management.  In her last role before retiring in December 2019, Jane was Global Head of Actelion, where she led the integration of the Swiss biotech business following its acquisition by Johnson & Johnson. Prior to that Jane had been Company Group Chair of Janssen EMEA, the group’s research based pharmaceutical arm. During her time with Johnson & Johnson, Jane led its Corporate Citizen Trust in EMEA and sponsored its Women’s Leadership Initiative.  Jane was also sponsor of Janssen’s Global Pharmaceuticals Sustainability Council.

Currently, Jane is a Non-Executive Director of the FTSE 100 companies, Johnson Matthey plc, and BAE Systems plc, and is chair of Theramex, a pharmaceutical company focussing on women’s health. She also sits on the Johnson and Johnson Impact Investment advisory board, an organisation which invests for impact in resource poor settings. Jane is a past Chair of the Executive committee of the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations, past Chairwoman of the PhRMA Europe Committee and a former member of the Corporate Advisory Board of the UK Government backed ‘Your Life’ campaign, aimed at encouraging more people to study STEM subjects.

 

Lisa Anson

Chief Executive Officer

Experienced General Manager, former President of AstraZeneca UK

Appointed in 2018, Lisa Anson has led the transformation of Redx into a clinical stage biotech with two programmes in clinical development and a growing pipeline of preclinical assets. During this time the company also secured major partnership deals for five assets with large and speciality pharma and secured long term financing with new blue chip life science focused investors.

Prior to joining Redx, Lisa had significant leadership experience in global pharmaceuticals over a 20-year career at AstraZeneca plc with her appointment in 2012 as President of AstraZeneca UK having held a series of senior commercial leadership roles in the company both the US and the UK. Lisa is also a key player in the industry, and in 2018 she was elected to the Board of the Bio Industry Association (BIA).  Previously Lisa has been President of the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI) and member of the board, where she chaired several UK industry committees and worked closely with the UK Government. Lisa started her career as a management consultant in London before moving to California with a cancer disease management company.

Lisa holds an MBA (awarded with distinction) from INSEAD, France and a First-Class honours degree in Natural Sciences from Cambridge University in the UK. Lisa currently lives in Cheshire with her husband and three children.

Peter Presland

Non-Executive Director

Finance, Audit and Corporate Governance specialist with several high profile organisations

Peter Presland joined the Board in November 2017 and has nearly 50 years’ experience in business, much of that at the highest levels of management within both public and private companies. A law graduate at King’s College, London, he also qualified as a Chartered Accountant with Arthur Andersen. In 1980, he joined C E Heath Plc, a major publicly quoted international insurance Group, as Group Accountant/Treasurer and became in 1985 the youngest ever PLC Director when appointed Group Finance Director at the age of 34. He was promoted to become Heath’s Group Chief Executive in 1990, and in 1996, he devised the demerger of C E Heath’s computer services operations into a separate publicly listed company, Rebus Group Plc, becoming its Chief Executive and in 1999 its Executive Chairman. Shareholders doubled their money in three years.

Since 2001, Peter has pursued a portfolio Non-Executive career. These appointments include the Chairmanship in 2003 of LINK, the UK ATM network, where he led a major corporate governance change and completed the merger of LINK with Voca, the provider of the BACS service, becoming Chairman of VocaLink in 2007. From 2012 to 2015, he served as Chairman of the Audit and Governance Committee of East Kent Hospitals NHS Trust and in 2019 was asked to become Chairman of the Governance and Finance Committee of The Lord’s Taverners, a high-profile charity. Peter is currently Chairman of Ashington Innovation PLC, a recently listed special purpose acquisition company.

Dr Bernhard Kirschbaum

Non-Executive Director

Former Executive Vice-President of Global Research at Merck Serono

Bernhard Kirschbaum joined the Board in January 2016. Bernd has over 25 years’ experience in pharmaceutical research and drug development, having held leadership roles at Merck/Merck Serono, Sanofi-Aventis, Aventis and Hoechst Marion Roussel. He has expertise in a broad range of disease areas including oncology, immuno-oncology, immunology, neurological disorders and cardiometabolic diseases. In the eight years to 2013, he worked at Merck/Merck Serono, becoming a member of the Board and Executive Vice-President, Global Research & Early Development. He was responsible for a budget of 1 billion euros and a global team of over 2,500 associates. In his last three years at Merck Serono, he led the successful growth of the company’s R&D portfolio, with over 70 programmes, doubling the number of Phase II assets in this period.

Bernd is currently Chairman of OMEICOS Therapeutics and GQ Bio-Therapeutics and a board member of BioMedX and Amarna Therapeutics as well as an advisor to the board of KAHR Medical.

Dr Joseph Anderson

Non-Executive Director

Partner, Sofinnova Crossover Strategy

Joe Anderson joined the Board in September 2023 and is a partner at Sofinnova Partners, a leading life-sciences venture capital firm.

Joe has over 30 years’ experience in the healthcare & life science industry. Joe was a partner at Abingworth LLP, where he led venture-style investments in public companies and the formation of the firm’s public equities fund. He also co-founded and was CEO at Arix Biosciences plc, a venture capital business listed on the London Stock Exchange. As an investor and active board member he has helped companies with financings, IPOs, and M&As, including Algeta (sold to Bayer), Amarin (listed on the Nasdaq), Autolus plc (listed on the Nasdaq) and Cytos (merged with Kuros). His early career was at the Wellcome Trust where he became head of the strategy group. He then moved into equities research as a pharmaceuticals analyst at Dresdner Kleinwort Benson, and then fund management at First State Investments, before moving into venture capital in 2004.

Natalie Berner

Non-Executive Director

Investor Director representing Redmile

Natalie joined Redx as a Non-Executive Director in May 2021 and brings extensive experience in the healthcare sector to the Board. She is a Managing Director focusing on Therapeutics at Redmile, which she joined in 2016. Prior to Redmile, Natalie was a Research Associate at the New York University School of Medicine. Natalie received a BA in Community Health from Brown University and a Certificate in Premedical Sciences from Columbia University.

Dr Rob Scott

Non-Executive Director

Former CMO at Abbvie

Rob Scott joined the Board in January 2022. Rob has over 30 years’ experience in pharmaceutical research and drug development, having held leadership roles at Pfizer, Atherogenics, Cerenis. Amgen and Abbvie. He has expertise in a broad range of disease areas including oncology, cardiology, nephrology, bone & inflammation, immunology, neuroscience, infectious disease and general medicine. Rob recently retired as the Chief Medical Officer at Abbvie where he had responsibility for around 40 new molecular entities, 4500 people and an annual budget of close to $3bn.

Rob is a leader in digital transformation of clinical research including a broad range of aspects from predictive analytics, innovative program and study design, synthetic and historical controls, pragmatic and real world studies, use of passive data collection using IoT and wearables and risk-based monitoring to name a few. He is currently on the board of ArisGlobal, Draupnir Bio and Confo Therapeutics and the scientific advisory boards of Variant Bio, Morningside Biopharma and BioEthics International. Rob is a paid Mentor to an EVP head of R&D at a midsize pharma and an SVP at a big pharma.