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| Magnus Precht |
| President |
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| Mr. Precht is a native of Stockholm, Sweden. He received his business degree from the University of Uppsala, Sweden in 1977. DFB Pharmaceuticals hired Mr. Precht in August of 2003 and appointed him president of Phyton Biotech in November of 2003. Mr. Precht is also Corporate Vice President of DFB Pharmaceuticals. Prior to working for DFB, he worked with biotech companies such as Gene Regulation Laboratories, where he served as CEO, and Sensus Drug Development Corporation (now part of Pfizer). Mr. Precht came to the United States in 1991 to launch the growth hormone, Genotropin, for Pharmacia (now a part of Pfizer). He previously held various positions in Austria and Sweden with Pharmacia and Abbott Scandinavia. |
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| Charles Swindell, Ph.D. |
| Vice President, Research and Development
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| Dr. Swindell joined Phyton Biotech in 2004. Prior to Phyton, he was Senior Vice President, Research and Development at Protarga, where he co-invented Protarga's targeted paclitaxel oncology drug, Taxoprexin® and led the R&D team responsible for Taxoprexin's advancement into Phase III clinical evaluation. From 1980 until he joined Protarga in 1999, Dr. Swindell served as Professor on the faculty of Bryn Mawr College in the Department of Chemistry. At Bryn Mawr, he led an internationally recognized and NIH-funded research program focused on the chemistry of paclitaxel, and invented a paclitaxel manufacturing process which was licensed to NaPro BioTherapeutics. He is an inventor on 22 issued patents, has published numerous scholarly articles, and has made more than 100 invited or submitted research presentations. Dr. Swindell received his BS from the University of Houston, Houston, Texas, his Ph.D. from Rice University, Houston, Texas, and carried out postdoctoral research as a Swiss National Science Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow at the ETH-Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland. |
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| Michael Horn, Ph.D. |
| Director, Cell and Molecular Biology |
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| Dr. Horn joined Phyton Biotech in 2005. He is responsible for Phyton's plant cell and molecular biology, strain development, and cryopreservation activities and leads Phyton's transgenic protein expression program. Dr. Horn received his undergraduate education at the University of Missouri and completed his Ph.D. in biology at the University of Illinois. He carried out postdoctoral research at Ciba-Geigy Biotechnology in RTP NC where he was among the first to genetically engineer a member of the Gramineae. Dr. Horn has had a highly productive career in plant biotechnology research and development. Michael was most recently employed at the Applied Biotechnology Institute (ABI) and ProdiGene where he was the Director of Cell Biology. |
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| Sarad Parekh, Ph.D. |
| Director, Cell Culture Process Development |
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| Dr. Parekh joined Phyton Biotech in 2005. He leads Phyton's Cell Culture Process development and Pilot Plant Operations. His expertise is in the use of plant, mammalian, and microbial cell culture technologies for the large scale production of biopharmaceuticals and cGMP fermentation processes. He received his Ph.D. in Industrial Fermentations Microbiology from the University Department of Chemical Technology, Bombay. Following several years at the University of Toronto (Chemical & Biochemical Engineering) and the University of Illinois (Food Engineering), Dr. Parekh was employed at Merck & Co., where he supervised an interdisciplinary team responsible for the development of early stage technology and its transfer to commercial manufacture. He was most recently employed at Dow Agrosciences as Global Technology Leader. At Dow, Dr. Parekh led the joint efforts between Eli Lilly and Dow for strain advancement and process optimization. More recently he was engaged in the use of plant cell culture technology for the production of transgenic proteins. Dr. Parekh is on the editorial board of Process Biochemistry International, and has edited three books on the industrial applications of cell culture-based processes. |
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| Venkatesh Srinivasan, Ph.D. |
| Director, Bioprocess Development |
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| Dr. Srinivasan has served Phyton Biotech as Director of Business Development since October 2004. Prior to that, Dr. Srinivasan was a key leader of the team that developed Phyton's commercial plant cell fermentation technology. Dr. Srinivasan has been with Phyton Biotech since March 1996. He has over twenty years experience in cell culture R&D and over sixteen years experience in the field of plant cell culture. Dr. Srinivasan is a Chemical Engineer by training and holds a Ph.D. from the State University of New York at Buffalo, and a B.Tech from the Indian Institute of Technology in Madras, India. |
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| Harald Heckenmüller, Ph.D. |
| General Manager, Phyton Biotech GmbH |
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| As General Manager of Phyton Biotech GmbH, a subsidiary of the DFB Pharmaceuticals division Phyton Biotech, Inc., Dr. Heckenmüller is responsible for all aspects of production for the company.
During his 25 years in the pharmaceutical industry, Dr. Heckenmüller has worked with both medium- and large-sized pharma companies, holding a variety of top positions in research and development, quality, and manufacturing in Germany and throughout Europe.
Immediately prior to joining Phyton, in 2000, he served as Vice President of Pharmaceutical and Analytical R&D for Astra Draco, now AstraZeneca. Former positions for other organizations included Head of Pharmaceutical Development, Head of Research and Development, and Production Manager.
Dr. Heckenmüller has initiated and supervised the development of a variety of innovative dosage forms, suitable devices, and diagnostic kits. He has authored and co-authored several patents.
Dr. Heckenmüller received his doctorate degree in Pharmacy at J. W. Goethe University of Frankfurt. He is a certified Pharmacist.
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