Experienced leader and drug discoverer who has worked in the pharmaceutical industry for over 20 years, following 10 years in academia. As Head of Oncology Drug Discovery for the Novartis Institute for Biomedical Research (NIBR), Basel Site, I have overseen significant part of NIBR’s global oncology drug discovery portfolio from target discovery to clinical development. While working in the Oncology Drug Discovery, I have initiated and supported the development of drugs like Glivec, Tasigna, Afinitor, Midostaurin, as well as PI3K inhibitors and many other signal transduction inhbitors that are in Phase I/II/III or preclinical development. In the past 6 years, working in the Expertise Platform Kinases at Novartis Basel (which I initiated and implemented), I focused on protein kinases as a target class for various therapeutic indications leading a group of scientists dedicated to integrated lead finding, profiling, project support and project management spanning oncology, immunology, inflammation, muscle, neuroscience, infection and neglected diseases. I have a long standing experience in drug discovery from early hit finding to H2L to lead optimization to introduction to clinical trials. I have worked successfully in various oncology programs in the pharmaceutical industry (Ciba and Novartis) for over 20 years and have a broad skill set in drug finding as well as managing people.

 Doriano  Fabbro, Chief  Scientific  Officer,  received  his  Ph.D.  in cell  biology  and biochemistry  at  the  University of Basel, where he worked afterwards for 12 years as Group Leader in Molecular Tumor Biology. In 1991, he joined the Oncology Group of Ciba-Geigy Basel. After the merger of Ciba-Geigy with Sandoz in 1996 he served at Novartis as Head of Kinase Biology until 2012. Doriano has contributed to the discovery and development of various protein kinase inhibitors for the treatment of cancer; e.g. Midostaurin®, Glivec®, Afinitor®, and Tasigna®. Doriano is author in more than 200 publications and numerous patents in the area of protein kinases regulation, structure, screening and drug discovery. He has been honored with the Novartis Oncology President’s Award (2005).