irasia.com


Pharmaxis Ltd

Board and Management Team

Board of Directors

Denis M Hanley AM MBA
Alan D Robertson BSc PhD
Peter Farrell AM PhD DSc
Malcolm J McComas BEc LLB
David McGarvey BA CA
John W Villiger MSocSci(Hons) PhD
Will Delaat



Senior Management Team

Chief Executive Officer:
Alan D Robertson BSc PhD

Chief Financial Officer:
David M McGarvey BA CA

Medical Director:
Brett Charlton MBBS PhD

Chief Operations Officer:
John Crapper BSc MBA

Chief Scientific Officer:
Ian A MacDonald BSc PhD

Commercial Director:
Gary Phillips BPharm MBA




Board of Directors

Denis M Hanley AM MBA
Independent Chairman

Denis Hanley is a leading expert in developing and commercialising new technology and has extensive experience in building Australian corporations to become successful global entities. He joined the board of Pharmaxis as chairman in October, 2001. Denis' experience includes 14 years as chief executive officer of Memtec Limited, growing the start-up company to become an international force in filtration and separations technology, listed on the New York Stock Exchange with a market capitalisation of US$400million. Prior to this, Denis spent more than a decade at global medical company Baxter Healthcare, both in the US and as Australian Managing Director.

Denis has served on the Australian Industry Research and Development Board and various technology councils and roundtables. He is a director of Lochard Limited, Universal Biosensors Inc., CathRx Pty Ltd and is a member of the Australian Government's Cooperative Research Centre Committee. In 1976 Denis was awarded an MBA with High Distinction and was named a Baker Scholar at the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration.

back to top  

Alan D Robertson BSc PhD
Chief Executive Officer

Alan has more than 20 years experience in drug discovery and product development with leading pharmaceutical companies, including 8 years with Wellcome plc in London and with Australian companies Faulding Ltd and Amrad Ltd. He also assisted early-stage pharmaceutical companies in their start-up and development and was the founding Managing Director of Pharmaxis. Alan has been CEO of Pharmaxis since December 1999 and has been instrumental in building the company to its present position. Alan joined the board of Pharmaxis in July, 2000. The co-inventor of 18 patents and author of more than 35 scientific papers, Alan has a PhD in synthetic organic chemistry from the University of Glasgow and has extensive practical understanding of both the clinical and management aspects of the pharmaceutical industry. He has been actively involved in the discovery, development and marketing of various compounds, including new treatments for migraine and cardiovascular disease. Alan is the inventor of the migraine therapeutic Zomig, which is marketed worldwide by AstraZeneca.

back to top  

Peter Farrell AM PhD DSc
Non-Executive Director

Dr Peter Farrell has spent more than 20 years developing and commercialising medical products in the USA, Europe, Japan and Australia. He is widely recognised as a leader in the fields of engineering, biomedicine and entrepreneurship, and was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia in 2004 for his services to biomedicalresearch and engineering. In 2005, Peter was named the US Entrepreneur of the Year for Health Sciences.

Peter began his commercial career with Baxter Healthcare Inc in Japan as Director and Vice President of Research and Development, then as Managing Director of the Baxter Center for Medical Research. He left Baxter in 1989 to establish ResMed Inc., a company that develops treatments for sleep-disordered breathing and respiratory failure. Peter is currently founding Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of ResMed Inc. Since its initial public offering in 1995, ResMed has achieved 40 consecutive quarters of record year-on-year growth in revenue and profits.

Peter also serves on the Executive Councils of Harvard Medical School and the University of California at San Diego, and is visiting Professor at the University of Sydney. Peter has written more than 150 papers covering a broad range of topics from engineering applications in medicine to focussing technology to meet business objectives.

back to top  

Malcolm J McComas BEc LLB
Non-Executive Director

Malcolm McComas is a company director and former lawyer with more than 20 years investment banking experience. He joined the Pharmaxis board in July 2003. He is currently a consultant to Grant Samuel, the investment banking, property services and funds management group and was a director of Grant Samuel from 1999 to 2004. He previously served for 10 years as Managing Director of Investment Banking at County NatWest and its successor organization Salomon Smith Barney (now Citigroup) and in various executive roles with Morgan Grenfell (now Deutsche Bank) in Melbourne, Sydney and London. He has worked with many high growth companies across various industry sectors and has experience in equity and debt finance, acquisitions and divestments and privatisations. He has led more than 50 initial public offerings and significant secondary offerings for companies, institutions and governments. He is non-executive chairman of Sunshine Heart, Inc and a national councillor of the Financial Services Institute of Australia.

back to top  

David McGarvey BA CA
Company Secretary and Chief Financial Officer

David has 18 years' experience as Chief Financial Officer of successful Australian-based international technology businesses, and he joined Pharmaxis in December 2002 in his current role.

After 10 years with PricewaterhouseCoopers, David joined high technology start-up Memtec Limited as Chief Financial Officer in 1985. David was instrumental in the US listing of Memtec Ltd on NASDAQ and subsequently on the NYSE, involving SEC filings, full US GAAP financial statements and dual-jurisdiction debt and equity raisings. During his time at Memtec and its acquirer US Filter, David managed the financial and legal aspects of over 30 acquisitions, mergers and divestitures in a number of European and American countries.

back to top  

John W Villiger MSocSci(Hons) PhD
Non-Executive Director (Appointed on 15 November 2006)

John Villiger is an independent director and investor. John co-founded The Medicines Company in 1996, and was Senior Vice President of Development until Febuary 2006. This business is NASDAQ listed with market capitalization of US$1.25 billion. The Medicines Company has a significant marketed product (Angiomax) with project sales of approximately $220 million in 2006, two other products in late stage clinical development (Cangrelor and Clevidipine), and around 300 employees.

Previously, John held various positions in product development at Roche from 1986 to 1996 in New Zealand and Switzerland, including International Project Director from 1991 to 1995 and Head of Global Project Management from 1995 to 1996. As Head of Global Project Management, he oversaw the development of Roche's pharmaceutical portfolio, with management responsibility for over 50 development programs and development teams in Switzerland, the UK, USA and Japan. John has a PhD in pharmacology from the University of Otago.

back to top  

Will Delaat
Non-Executive Director (Appointed on 24 June 2008)

Mr Delaat has 35 years experience in the global pharmaceutical industry, most recently as the managing director of the Australian subsidiary of Merck & Co., a position he held from 1997 until his recent retirement.

During his career Mr Delaat has held executive positions in both Europe and Australia for Merck and AstraZeneca. Mr Delaat is experienced in sales and marketing and has been responsible for international product launches and commercialisation of respiratory products.

Mr Delaat also serves the pharmaceutical industry in important representative roles. He is chairman of the Australian pharmaceutical industry's peak body, Medicines Australia, and is chairman of the Pharmaceuticals Industry Council.

back to top  

Senior Management Team

Alan D Robertson BSc PhD
Chief Executive Officer

Alan has more than 20 years experience in drug discovery and product development with leading pharmaceutical companies, including 8 years with Wellcome plc in London and with Australian companies Faulding Ltd and Amrad Ltd. He also assisted early-stage pharmaceutical companies in their start-up and development and was the founding Managing Director of Pharmaxis. Alan has been CEO of Pharmaxis since December 1999 and has been instrumental in building the company to its present position. Alan joined the board of Pharmaxis in July, 2000. The co-inventor of 18 patents and author of more than 35 scientific papers, Alan has a PhD in synthetic organic chemistry from the University of Glasgow and has extensive practical understanding of both the clinical and management aspects of the pharmaceutical industry. He has been actively involved in the discovery, development and marketing of various compounds, including new treatments for migraine and cardiovascular disease. Alan is the inventor of the migraine therapeutic Zomig, which is marketed worldwide by AstraZeneca.

back to top  

David M McGarvey BA CA
Company Secretary and Chief Financial Officer

David has 18 years' experience as Chief Financial Officer of successful Australian-based international technology businesses, and he joined Pharmaxis in December 2002 in his current role.

After 10 years with PricewaterhouseCoopers, David joined high technology start-up Memtec Limited as Chief Financial Officer in 1985. David was instrumental in the US listing of Memtec Ltd on NASDAQ and subsequently on the NYSE, involving SEC filings, full US GAAP financial statements and dual-jurisdiction debt and equity raisings. During his time at Memtec and its acquirer US Filter, David managed the financial and legal aspects of over 30 acquisitions, mergers and divestitures in a number of European and American countries.

back to top  

Brett Charlton MBBS PhD
Medical Director

Brett is a medical researcher and specialist in autoimmune disease and diabetes, and has over 15 years experience in clinical trial design and management. Brett co-founded Pharmaxis with Bill Cowden in 1998 and was instrumental in negotiating licence and research arrangements and attracting funding. He has been medical director since 1998. Brett has written more than 60 scientific papers, attracted significant research grants and served on prefessional society committees. He has been a consultant to the pharmaceutical, medical and biotech industry since 1985. Brett was founding Medical Director of the National Health Sciences Centre and established its Clinical Trial Unit. Prior to joining Pharmaxis, he held positions with the Australian National University, Stanford University, the Baxter Centre for Medical Research, Royal Melbourne Hospital and the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute. Brett has an MBBS with Honours from the University of New South Wales and completed his PhD at the Centre for Biomedical Engineering in 1985.

back to top  

John Crapper BSc MBA
Chief Operations Officer

John has 32 years of manufacturing and operations experience, 17 years of which has been in the pharmaceutical industry. He is formerly Senior Vice-President and General Manager of Memcor International and Managing Director Memcor Australia Pty Ltd. Formerly a subsidiary of Memtec Ltd, is a world leader in the design and manufacture of microfiltration membranes and systems.

During his 15 years at Memcor, John managed the scale up manufacturing equipment and processes from the company's research and development group, created full scale production operations and managed the establishment of the QA (Quality Assurance) and ERP (Enterprise Planning Resource) systems.

Prior to this John was Technical Director at Syntex Pharmaceutical's Animal Health division and start-up veterinary pharmaceutical company, VR Laboratories.

back to top  

Ian A MacDonald BSc PhD
Chief Scientific Officer

Dr Ian McDonald has 25 years' international experience in managing drug discovery and design teams in Europe and USA. He was most recently Vice President of Drug Discovery at Structural GenomiX, USA. Prior experience includes a similar position at Structural Bioinformatics, Vice President of Chemistry with responsibilities for medicinal and bio-chemistry at SIBIA Neuroscience (now part of Merck Research Laboratories) and Merrell Dow (now part of Sanofi-Aventis). Under his leadership, six compounds have been developed and evaluated in clinical trials.

Ian was awarded his BSc and PhD degrees in chemistry from the University of Western Australia and has co-authored over 74 peer-reviewed manuscripts and book chapters, and is an inventor on 38 issued US patents.

back to top  

Gary Phillips BPharm MBA
Commercial Director

Gary has broad operational experience across the pharmaceutical industry value chain after spending the last 22 years in the healthcare industry in Europe, Asia and Australia. He joined Pharmaxis in December, 2003. Gary has an extensive track record in marketing and sales, including new product launches, brand repositioning, process improvement and customer targeting programs. He was previously CEO of Novartis Australia where he successfully launched breakthrough oncology and ophthalmology products and relaunched newly acquired primary care products. His previous roles include Area Director, Asia, for Novartis and CEO of Ciba Geigy in Hungary.

He has an honours degree in Pharmacy from Nottingham University, UK and an MBA from Henley Management College.

back to top  

updated 24th June, 2008


  • Company's Index
  • irasia.com

  • © Copyright 1996-2008 irasia.com Ltd. All rights reserved. Tel: (852) 2831-9792.
    DISCLAIMER: irasia.com Ltd makes no guarantee as to the accuracy or completeness of any information provided on this website. Under no circumstances shall irasia.com Ltd be liable for damages resulting from the use of the information provided on this website.
    TRADEMARK & COPYRIGHT: All intellectual property rights subsisting in the contents of this website belong to irasia.com Ltd or have been lawfully licensed to irasia.com Ltd for use on this website. All rights under applicable laws are hereby reserved. Reproduction of this website in whole or in part without the express written permission of irasia.com Ltd is strictly prohibited.
    TERMS OF USE: Please read the Terms of Use governing the use of our website.