A Parade of Panels
Alliance skills. The once and future biopharma partnering landscape. Global and commercial launch factors. Cultural intelligence. Platforms, patients, and partnerships. What’s the common denominator? You guessed it: all that and more will be the subject of several scintillating panel discussions highlighting days one and two of the 2023 ASAP BioPharma Conference coming up very soon—next week!—in Boston.
One of those panels will be titled “Driving Organizational Value in a Changing Landscape: Maximizing Essential Individual and Team Alliance Skills,” to be moderated by Chris Black, CA-AM, head of corporate alliance management and integration at Merck & Co., with panelists Markus Kropf, vice president and head of global alliance management at Merck KGaA; Cindy Warren, vice president of business development, global neuroscience, at Johnson & Johnson (and ASAP board member); and Arne Wörn, PhD, global head of alliance management at Novartis.
The Big Biopharma Picture
What’s it all about? According to Black, the panel’s conversation will be premised on the observation that alliances are now critical to the success of so many biopharma companies that there really isn’t any question anymore about the need for good alliance management.
“Strategic alliances have been around for decades,” he said. “Just think about how significantly our industry has changed over that time horizon. We thought it would be interesting to have senior alliance leaders, whose organizations collectively represent a large number of alliances and alliance managers, take time to talk about the current dynamics in the biopharma alliance space, and share their views on how it’s changed. We will then talk about what this means for evolving the capabilities and skills that alliance professionals need to succeed so that as a community, alliance managers continue driving organizational value.”
Launch Before Lunch
Did we mention the future? Well, there’s no time like the present to start planning for it. That’s the theme of “Now’s the Time: Planning for the Future of Successful Global Alliances.” This one will be moderated by Christine Carberry, CSAP, principal at Carberry Consulting, with panelists Adam Kornetsky, principal at Vantage Partners; Leslie Meltzer, PhD, chief medical officer at Orchard Therapeutics; and Hélène Svahnqvist, CA-AM, vice president and head of alliance management at Life Edit. Do you believe your alliance will not only go commercial, but global? Then it’s high time to start planning and forming a strategy now to get out there and conquer the world, and the group assembled for this panel can certainly help guide your thinking.
Another panel on day one of the conference will be “Launch Factors: An Alliance and Program Leadership Perspective on Achieving Commercial Success.” It will be moderated by Eyal Golan, director at Integrated Project Management (IPM), with panelists Jenny Mahoney, PhD, director of alliance management at Alnylam Pharmaceuticals; Ian Pudge, principal consultant at Integrated Project Management (IPM); and Mio Sekine, director of alliance and integration management and business development at Amgen. Also delving into the commercial alliance realm, this panel of subject matter experts will look at new product launches and the factors that go into achieving commercial success, including the importance of the alignment and management of cross-functional work.
But Wait, There’s More…
After the hors d’oeuvres and drinks of the first-night reception, the next day will kick off with another sort of beverage. That would be Jake Beverage, vice president of alliance management at AbCellera and moderator of the plenary panel “Advancing Drug Discovery Through Platform Alliances,” who will lead panelists Nancy Griffin, CSAP, principal of Cairn Consulting LLC; Jonathan Kern, PhD, vice president of global alliances at AbbVie; and Scott Miller, senior director of early phase alliance management at Eli Lilly and Company, through a discussion of this increasingly important area of drug development, and of life sciences partnering.
Still thirsty for more? Then how about “Cultural Intelligence: Successful Cross-Cultural Collaboration in Biotech Alliances”? The moderator will be alliance leader Mark Coflin, CSAP, president of Alliance Partnering Consultants and no stranger to cross-cultural collaborations himself, along with panelists Gisel Lopez, associate director of global alliance management at Apellis Pharmaceuticals; biopharma industry veteran Brian Stewart, CA-AM, formerly head of alliance management at Apellis Pharmaceuticals; and Amy Tatsutani, CA-AM, PhD, executive director of alliance management at Gilead Sciences. This stellar quartet will provide the lowdown on navigating cultural differences and considerations to partner successfully with biotechs around the globe, from the US to Europe to Asia and Latin America. Spoiler alert: diverse teams and more open communication help!
Finally, “Stick to Your Strengths: Optimizing Platform-to-Patient Partnerships” will feature yet again the illuminating expertise of Christine Carberry as moderator, with panelists Lisa Mendoza, CA-AM, PhD, head of partner success at Dyno Therapeutics; and Nate Springman, alliance management lead at Spark Therapeutics. They’ll share their platform partnering experiences and likely explain how “Stick to Your Strengths” is very different from “stick to your knitting” and “stay in your lane”—at least we hope so! In any case, partnering lessons will be available in abundance!
Speaking of abundance, you will NOT want to miss the plentiful cornucopia of other presentations, keynotes, fireside chats, master classes, roundtables, and networking breaks and receptions that will fill up the docket and fulfill your wildest alliance management dreams at this year’s ASAP BioPharma Conference, coming up in Boston, Nov. 6–8. Haven’t registered yet? What’s up with that? Get on the stick! Go to asapbiopharma.org now and get it done!
