CEO Monthly December 2017

6 CEO MONTHLY / DECEMBER 2017 , Batavia Biosciences focuses on accelerating the transition of biopharmaceutical product candidates fromdiscovery to the clinic with improved success and lower cost. The firm is people’s flexible partner to rely on at all stages of biopharmaceutical process development. Menzo Havenga outlines the biopharmaceutical sector, and describes the services that the company offers. Accelerate Biotechnology Batavia employs state-of-the- art laboratory infrastructure both in Netherlands (Leiden) and USA (Boston) and is well equipped to develop any biopharmaceutical, be it an antibody, recombinant protein or vaccine from early discovery all the way through to clinical manufacturing. Batavia is proud to have assembled a world class R&D organization (over 100 FTE) that knows the challenges associated with biopharmaceutical product development, which it leverages to provide solutions to its sponsors. Next to its capabilities and knowhow Batavia also develops a range of unique tools and technologies that facilitate the development and manufacturing of biopharmaceuticals at reduced cost and accelerated timelines. The market for biopharmaceuticals, i.e., medicines made via biotechnology, has exploded over the last two decades with current annual sales of about 125 billion USD for recombinant proteins and antibodies and approximately 30 billion USD for vaccines. These medicines have a massive impact on human health, providing life- saving and improving treatments for diseases ranging from cancer, haemophilia, diabetes to infectious disease. Examples of block buster products (sales over 1 billion USD annual) include erythropoietin (treatment anemia; 10 billion USD), insulin (treatment diabetes; 10 billion USD), remicade (treatment arthritis, 5 billion USD), Prevnar, (prevention diphtheria 2 billion USD), and gardasil (prevention cervical cancer; 2 billion USD) to name but a few. The enormous sales success and societal impact of these medicines fuel the research and development to discover novel products and to date annually 65 billion USD is globally spent on the development of new and improved versions of biopharmaceuticals. Based on the number of novel compounds in development, the USA represents by far the most active market (±4000 compounds), followed by Europe (±2000 compounds), Japan (±500 compounds) with another ±3000 compounds for the rest of the world. From the annual 65 billion USD flowing into R&D, by far the biggest portion (60 billion USD) is consumed by clinical trials. Here, regulations stipulate that the safety and efficacy of new biopharmaceuticals must be thoroughly investigated in controlled human clinical studies before market authorization can be obtained. Clinical testing is performed in three stages whereby the candidate biopharmaceutical product is first tested for safety (phase 1; tens to hundreds of individuals), followed by testing for efficacy (phase 2, hundreds to thousands of individuals), and finally for combined safety & efficacy in large patient cohorts (phase 3; many thousands of patients). The remaining annual R&D spend of about 5 billion USD is to develop the manufacturing process for these novel biopharmaceuticals, such that they can be produced to the high- quality standards demanded but also at an affordable price. It is in this field that Batavia Biosciences is active, offering its capabilities, knowhow and experience to biotech companies, internationally operating large pharma and not for profit organizations including academia, government philanthropic and charitable organizations. Menzo starts off by telling us how it feels to have been selected as CEO of the Year 2017 in Netherlands, and describes his responsibilities as CEO. He is 1712CE11 quick to praise his staff and the teamwork which leads to his, and therefore the company’s ultimate success. “Honestly, I am proud to have been selected CEO of the year 2017 in the Netherlands as it reflects on Batavia’s success. Clearly, the success of Batavia can only be achieved by working hard together and therefore I see the award as an external token of appreciation for the work done by all Batavia employees.” Batavia Biosciences is managed by the Executive Management team consisting of Menzo and his business partner Chris Yallop (COO & CSO). His responsibilities as CEO are grouped in five distinct areas, i.e., (i) shareholders communication, (ii) company financing, (iii) merger & acquisition, (iv) public relations and public affairs, and (v) ambassador in business acquisition. Below a brief description of the tasks that are part of these responsibility areas. He refers to his leadership style and responsibilities, and what he does to get the best out of his staff. “In my role as CEO I am responsible for delivering the financial year-end report, as