ORPHALAN - Key Persons
Angelita Briffa joined Orphalan in May 2020 as Chief Accounting Officer, with over 15 years of experience in auditing and accounting of international groups of companies, public listed and private, in various industries, but in particular in online Gaming and ancillary services.
She has held senior positions with PricewaterhouseCoopers Malta, within the Assurance department, and Catena Media plc, a company listed on Nasdaq Stockholm, throughout her career.
She graduated from the University of Malta in 2002 with an Accountancy (Hons) degree and is also a member of The Malta Institute of Accountants.
Chahra Louafi - Chief Investment Officer
Chahra Louafi is Investment Director and head of the fund for biotherapies and rare diseases at Bpifrance (previously CDC Entreprises). Prior to joining CDC Entreprises, she was in charge of project development and company creation in a private incubator specialized in biotechnologies.
Chris joined Orphalan in 2021, bringing with him over thirty years of operational experience in all aspects of the pharmaceutical industry including API, solid dosage, aseptic operations, biologics and blood products.
Chris's expertise lies in organisational and team development, technology transfer and product commercialisation, as well as GMP remediation programs and quality management system implementation. Prior to joining Orphalan he has held senior quality positions at Mundipharma, Genzyme-Sanofi, Merck and Baxter in the UK, Europe and USA.
Chris has a BSc and PhD in Chemistry from the University of Newcastle.
Dmitry has had leadership roles for over twenty six years in the pharmaceutical and medical device industry in general management with both P&L and sales responsibility, new product commercialization in rare oncology diseases, development of new product marketing strategy and team leadership in large organizations.
For the last 20 years he has been in Fortune 100 health care companies. Most recently at Abbot where he had responsibilities for a 12 country region, with 122 people reporting into him. He has also held executive roles at Medtronic and Bristol Myers Squibb.
He brings a unique international worldview, with multiple expatriate assignments in Europe, Russia and Asia. He studied Marketing & Finance at Kellogg School of Management.
Dr. Emmanuelle Voisin founded Voisin Consulting Life Sciences (VCLS) in 1997, a leading advisor to Biotech, Pharma and Medtech manufacturers for the development, registration and launch of innovative medical technologies across international markets.
Emmanuelle has 30+ years' experience in drug development. Her expertise lies in non-conventional development strategies. Emmanuelle also provides strategic advice for interacting with FDA and EMA.
Emmanuelle holds a pharmacy degree and was a Resident in the Paris Hospital Authorities (Ancien Interne des Hôpitaux de Paris).
Emmanuelle has published a number of articles. She is a member of the Avicenna Alliance and leads the Policy Development Working Group of the Alliance and is a member of organisations of professionals in Regulatory (Eucope, TOPRA, RAPS, DIA,…).
She is a member of the Advisory Board of AC Immune and serves on the Board of Endodiag.
Job Titles:
- Head of Corporate Affairs & Project Management
Géraldine joined Orphalan in December 2020 with over 15 years of industry practice in legal and corporate activities.
Prior to joining Orphalan, Géraldine worked at Medday Pharmaceuticals in France where she was the head of legal covering global legal and corporate activities.
Before that, she has held various single legal director positions with a focus on business development, at Mundipharma in France and Pfizer in France and in the US.
Géraldine is a French qualified lawyer with a master's degree in contract Law and Paris Bar.
Job Titles:
- Head of Portfolio Strategy and Planning
Ivo Sulovsky joined Orphalan in January 2024. He brings 25 years of international experience in strategy and business development in various industrial areas as well as in commercial leadership roles in the pharmaceutical industry in Europe and the US.
Most recently he served as Vice-President & General Manager of the German speaking countries region at Ipsen Pharma, where he was responsible for the re-organization of the region and the ramp-up of the Oncology, Neuroscience and Rare Disease franchises. Before that, he was responsible for building the Rare Disease commercial activities in the US. Prior to Ipsen, he held numerous commercial leadership roles at Amgen in Austria, Germany and Central and Eastern Europe. Before working as a leader in the pharmaceutical industry, he had been working as a consultant, project leader and principal at the Boston Consulting Group, Roland Berger and IQVIA.
Ivo holds a master's degree in international Trade and Business Administration from the University of Economics in Vienna.
A graduate of EDHEC Business School, Mr. Morin began his career in 2005 at MAZARS, as a Financial Auditor for Private Equity Firms. In 2009, he joined CDC Enterprises, a Funds Management company, as Financial Manager where he was involved in structuring several investment funds and for the portfolio monitoring, mostly in Venture Capital.
In September 2013, Mr. Morin joined the Life Sciences investment activities. He is now an Investment Director dedicated mostly to creating and developing biotechnology companies in France.
Job Titles:
- Head of International Markets
- Senior Commercial Executive
John Fatuhi, senior commercial executive with over 35 years experience in international sales, joined Orphalan in 2020.
He gained considerable experience in commercialisation and supply chain during a 32 year career at the world's largest speciality distribution company Univar Plc.
Over the past 10 years he has worked on expanding rare disease medication access in various International Markets including the US, Australasia, LATAM and China.
Job Titles:
- Head Commercial Hub Malta
- Senior Level Executive
Margot Pisani, senior level executive with over 25 years' experience working in multinational pharmaceutical companies, joined Orphalan in 2019.
Starting out in sales she has held various positions in sales and marketing, communications, and public affairs. Prior to joining Orphalan, she was for 14 years General Manager of Sanofi Malta Ltd., where she was instrumental in setting up the affiliate and building a successful team. She also sat on the regional council that was based in Italy.
Throughout her career she has been active in local and international pharmaceutical associations. Most recently she was a founding member of the board that governed the Maltese Medicines Verification Organisation.
Margot is a Pharmacist and holds an Msc in Management.
Massimo Boriero joined Orphalan in 2021, but he played an instrumental role building Orphalan commercial organization, back in 2018. He brings more than 25 years of international pharmaceutical industry experience in commercialization, market access, strategic and business development.
Most recently he served as Vice-President & General Manager Southern Europe, France & BeNeLux at Akcea Therapeutics, where he led the founding and build-up of the complete business and organization.
Prior to Akcea, he managed the establishment and commercial set-up of the European Business at Spark Therapeutics, later acquired by Roche and, prior to that, he served as President, EMEA, at Aegerion Pharmaceuticals.
In a period of 17 years before this he had been working in several management positions at national and international level for Genzyme Therapeutics. Massimo is a physician by education, trained in Turin and at Harvard Business School.
Naseem Amin joined Orphalan in 2017. He brings thirty years of International industry experience in Research and Development, Corporate and Business Development, Venture Capital and Marketing. Naseem has previously served as Executive Chairman at Arix Biocience Plc, listed on the LSE, Venture Partner at Advent Life Sciences, Chief Scientific Officer at Smith and Nephew, where he oversaw corporate R&D, divisional manufacturing, QA/QC and product development functions. Prior to Smith and Nephew, Naseem led the business development functions at both Biogen and Genzyme Therapeutics. For both companies, he initiated and executed a number of transformative acquisitions and transactions.
Naseem has also led the clinical development of five currently marketed therapeutic products. Naseem started his career at Baxter Healthcare where he had executive roles in marketing, product development and clinical research. In addition to his role at Orphalan, Naseem currently serves as a board member and advisor to several not for profit organisations, and a publicly listed biotechnology company listed on the NASDAQ. Naseem is a qualified medical doctor, from the University College Medical School, London and has an MBA from Kellogg Graduate School of Management.
Job Titles:
- Physician
- Senior Medical Director
Omar Kamlin joined Orphalan in November 2020 relocating from Australia to the UK. Omar is a physician, graduating from Imperial College London. After training as a paediatrician in the UK, Omar based himself as a clinician researcher in Melbourne, Australia at the Newborn Research Centre at the Royal Women's Hospital. A practising neonatologist, Omar brings to Orphalan experience from 17 years in perinatal science academia and clinical leadership with over 100 peer reviewed publications.
Omar has extensive experience in clinical trials. He has initiated and executed a number of transformative studies with dissemination of evidence that has changed clinical practice including updates to international neonatal resuscitation guidelines.
Sandra Bensoussan joined Orphalan in 2020, with over 15 years of industry experience in international legal departments.
Sandra has developed a strong legal expertise in the health care and life science industries through experiences in prominent multinational companies as Johnson and Johnson. She has structured the International legal department of the American company, Wright Medical, and has led cross-functional and cross-regional projects.
Sandra is a French qualified lawyer, with a master's degree in health law and the Paris Bar.
Shahzad Malik has a strong background in science, clinical medicine, and international finance. He gained an MA in Physiological Sciences from Oxford University and an MD from Cambridge University, after which he specialised in interventional cardiology while also pursuing clinical and fundamental scientific research in heart muscle disorders.
Shahzad has been actively involved with 21 portfolio Companies in Europe and the USA in all sectors of Life Sciences, including Algeta, Respivert, Biocartis and PowderMed. Shahzad currently serves on the Board of several portfolio Companies, including Acutus, Agenus and Versartis.
Job Titles:
- Chief Development Officer
Tim joined Orphalan in 2021. He has over twenty-five years' experience leading international multi-disciplined matrix teams within pharma and academia. Tim has lead R&D teams progressing assets in multiple therapeutic areas, including hepatology, chronic pain, asthma, oncology and anti-infectives, through all phases of preclinical and clinical development, generating multiple marketed products.
Prior to joining Orphalan, Tim was Head of Clinical Development at Mundipharma. Previously he held an academic position at the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, USA and senior R&D positions within Pfizer, Eisai, Takeda, and PrEP Biopharm.
Tim has a BSc and PhD in Biochemistry from the University of Bath.