R&D Investment, Public Policy and Patient Access Interconnectedness

  

Ulrich Neumann, MBA, MSc, MA, BSc, BA, FRSA, is a leader in the Scientific Affairs group at Johnson & Johnson, where he oversees research projects and academic collaborations on health policy and methods, including value assessment, insurance design and innovation/ R&D strategies. Previously, Ulrich held leadership roles at the drug development platform Certara, and Analytica Laser, a global HEOR consultancy. He also founded Pharmvivo, a firm specializing in commercial due diligence, and served as U.S. Managing Director for a pharmaceutical market insights and networking firm now part of Thomson Reuters. As a business leader, Ulrich has developed value and evidence generation strategies across a dozen therapeutic areas. His scientific work has been presented at conferences such as AMCP and ISPOR and published in leading journals, including Nature Drug Discovery and Journal of Medical Economics. A recognized expert on drug pricing, access, and innovation policy, he has authored numerous articles, whitepapers, and reports on topics such as R&D economics, payer management, risk-based contracting, and financing for cell and gene therapies. He frequently speaks at industry conferences and participates in panel discussions on these issues. Trained in public and business administration, Ulrich holds graduate degrees from Imperial College London (MBA), the London School of Economics (MSc), and the University of Southern California Annenberg School (MA), as well as technical certificates from MIT, the Kellogg School of Management, and Columbia University.

Steve Potts has been a vocal supporter of the urgent need to modify the Inflationary Reduction Act to avoid further ongoing harm to small molecule drug development, and has spoken on this topic in many audiences, including testifying in the US Congress. He has worked in oncology since 1999 and has experience in a wide range of areas across drug development and diagnostics, including medical affairs, clinical trials, product development, sales, marketing, and general management. He founded the multi-armed viral immunotherapy company, OncoMyx, in 2018 and raised  $75M total of venture funding. Previously, he was Vice President of Medical Affairs at Ignyta, which was acquired by Roche/Genentech in 2017, and he led the global operation of the testing of over 20,000 patients in an oncology basket trial for entrectinib in 15 countries. The ROS1 & TRK kinase inhibitor, now launched by Roche (www.rozlytrek.com), was the first in the industry to receive simultaneous breakthrough designation equivalents in USA, Europe, and Japan, and also one of the first to run a global concurrent registrational adult and pediatric trial. Prior to this he founded several companies with high return exits to investors in oncology pathology diagnostics and pharma services. He also built the first bioinformatics department at Quest Diagnostics, supporting one of the USA's largest next generation sequencing clinical laboratories. He earned his PhD in Bioengineering from UC Davis, an MBA from UC Davis, and a BS in Physics from Wheaton College, Illinois. He lives in Peoria, Arizona.