Seek

Gregory Stoloff founded SEEK – formerly known as PepTcell - in 2004 after a distinguished career in investment banking spanning 20 years, working in a broad range of institutions including Deutsche Bank and UBS. He initially concentrated on corporate finance and was involved in numerous mergers and acquisitions and structured finance with an emphasis on the healthcare industry, including mergers by GlaxoSmithKline, Aventis and Pfizer. Gregory then moved on to concentrate on project finance and was involved in financings for major pharmaceutical companies such as Roche, Merck and Novartis and across various other sectors. Gregory also has a wealth of experience in advising and working with medical research companies.

Gregory is a qualified Chartered Accountant and has spent many years researching scientific medical issues, specifically related to the immune system. He has also been involved in several publications, recounting research in the peptide space and is listed as an inventor in numerous patents for cancer, HIV, mosquito-borne diseases and influenza.

Gregory has been instrumental in the development of the concepts pursued by SEEK and has been the driving force behind the Group’s continued growth and diversification.

Robin Bannister joined the Group in 2008 when his Company, Biocopea was acquired by SEEK – then known as PepTcell. Robin focuses on the discovery of novel biology based upon existing drugs and drug templates and the subsequent identification and exploitation of high–value, low-risk products. Robin is a successful drug-discovery and development entrepreneur. Before founding Biocopea, Robin co-founded Arakis, which successfully discovered, developed and licensed a pipeline of products and was acquired by Sosei Corporation in 2005. Arakis’ pipeline was the basis for successfully raising over £50m during a five-year period. Arakis licensed its lead product to Novartis, in the largest European biotech deal in 2005, with a headline value of $325m and was subsequently sold to Sosei Corporation in the same year. Robin served on the Board of Sosei until leaving in 2008. Prior to this, Robin was at Chiros, Chiroscience and Celltech (as Preclinical Development Director). Robin’s early career was at Smith Kline and French.

Robin is a chemist by background training and studied at Imperial College, London receiving his PhD in 1988.

Manfred Scheske joined the Executive Team of SEEK in October 2010, having enjoyed a highly successful 25-year career with GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) in Europe, North America and at a global level within GSK’s Consumer Healthcare Leadership Team. Manfred has full responsibility for SEEK’s small molecule portfolio, incorporated in infirst+ HEALTHCARE. At GSK, Manfred was President of the pharmaceutical company’s £2 billion strong European Consumer Healthcare business (including brands as alli, Aquafresh, Beechams, Corsodyl, Lucozade, Niquitin, Panadol. Piriton, Poligrip, Ribena, Sensodyne, Solpadeine, Zantac, Zovirax, etc.) from 2004 to 2010 and also spent six years as President of GSK’s Consumer Healthcare business in North America. His most recent successes include the pan-European launch of alli, a weight loss drug, in 29 countries in 2009. This was the first ever pan-European switch (from Rx to OTC), and under Manfred’s leadership, alli became the third largest OTC brand in Europe, receiving numerous awards from the industry and achieving sales in excess of £100m in its first year.

Wilson Caparrós-Wanderley has led SEEK’s scientific R&D programmes since the Company was founded in 2004. He has not only helped to build the Company’s strong pipeline, but also been instrumental in building a diverse and multi-disciplined research team. He was educated at the University of Barcelona in Spain and completed his Ph.D. at King's College London (KCL), concentrating on virology, immunology and molecular biology. Prior to joining SEEK, Wilson spent 10 years in academia at KCL and Imperial College, London, where he still retains an honorary position. He has contributed to many scientific peer-reviewed publications. Wilson also spent three years at Lipoxen, where he focused on vaccine research and virology.

James Synge has been with SEEK since its initial founding in 2004 and was instrumental in its formation. James started his career over 25 years ago with a Chartered Accounting firm in Sydney, Australia. Following his time as a Chartered Accountant, he worked in investment banking and spent 15 years holding senior positions in Bankers Trust, Deutsche Bank and UBS in Australia, Germany and Switzerland. During this time, he spent time working in the corporate divisions, concentrating on taxation and regulatory matters and then moved into the international structured finance groups in all three organisations. While in investment banking, James was involved in numerous transactions across a wide range of industries including Media, Infrastructure and Finance.

Since 2001, James has held a number of pivotal investment and management roles in companies in a wide range of sectors including Biotechnology, Funds Management, Internet Service Companies and Gaming enterprises. James is an experienced private investor who lends both financial and management experience to a broad range of companies.

Stuart Robinson joined SEEK in 2006 from Skyepharma, where he was European Vice President of Business Development. At SEEK, he has responsibility for Business Development and Medical Affairs and has led the clinical and commercial development of the Company’s HIV and influenza vaccine programmes, successfully bringing both vaccines to clinical stage development.

Prior to joining SEEK, he had spent the last 25 years working in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry, holding positions in research, medical affairs, sales, marketing, intellectual property management and licensing with a number of companies including Fisons, Chiroscience, Andaris, Penwest and latterly Skyepharma. He completed a range of collaboration agreements with companies such as GSK, Mundipharma and Zeneus. Stuart has maintained a medical research interest as both author and inventor.

Stuart has a Ph.D. in immunology from Guy’s Hospital Medical School in London.

John Brew joined SEEK in 2009 after a 12 year career within the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries. He initially joined a company focusing on technologies enhancing the efficacy of biological medical products involving proteins, liposomes and viruses such as the adenovirus used in gene therapy. He successfully led a range of projects (e.g. the preclinical development of universal red blood cells and long acting insulin), and was a member of the team that developed a number of enhanced pharmaceutical properties of products in late stage development (e.g. factor VIII and Onxy-015). John then joined Arakis and successfully led a number of small molecule anti-inflammatory and analgesic projects, including a treatment for diabetic nephropathy, which he led from inception to Phase II clinical development, a transdermal neuropathic pain programme (from inception to non-clinical development phase), and a small molecule treatment of autoimmune disease, focusing on inflammatory bowel disease (from inception to Phase I clinical development). John subsequently worked as a consultant for Serentis, a dermal anti-inflammatory company, where he successfully enhanced their pipeline of dermatitis products.

John is an experienced pharmacologist and biologist with an excellent knowledge of a wide range of therapeutic areas, including pain, autoimmune disease, CNS disorders and cardiovascular disease.

Suzanne joined SEEK in 2008 when the company, a2sp Limited, of which she was a co-founder, was acquired by SEEK. Suzanne studied for her degree and PhD in Chemistry at Loughborough University. From Loughborough, Suzanne moved to the University of Warwick where she developed a platform technology to facilitate the study the interactions between small molecule drugs and proteins. The award of a prestigious BBSRC/Royal Society of Edinburgh Enterprise Fellowship allowed Suzanne to spin the technology out of the university and co-found a2sp Limited. a2sp operated successfully serving the wider pharmaceutical industry as a contract research organisation (CRO) until 2008. Suzanne’s expertise and this unique platform contributes to SEEK’s abilities to generate a novel portfolio of drug candidates.