
Merck-Novartis revolving door spins again as AI leader Iya Khalil switches pharmas
As talk of AI this-and-that gobbles up headline after headline, one Big Pharma is losing its AI leader as she transitions to another drug giant: Iya Khalil will trade in her hat as Novartis’ go-to expert and leader in the space for Merck as VP and head of data, AI and genome sciences next week.
After nearly three years leading the artificial intelligence team at Novartis — as Big Pharma and biotechs alike latch onto the ripening AI-for-drug-discovery mode of operation — Khalil will switch employers to head up a similar post at Merck, where she’ll work out of Cambridge, MA beginning Feb. 13, the company tells Endpoints News.
In her farewell post on LinkedIn this week, Khalil thanked Novartis and her colleagues, with a specific shout-out reserved for Fiona Marshall, the veteran drug hunter who swapped the role of head of discovery at Merck for the chief post at Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research last fall.
“I will especially miss all of my colleagues for their generous spirit and relentless commitment to science and advancing medicines for patients,” Khalil said in her post to the networking site. “You are all amazing and please keep on executing the important mission of reimagining medicine to improve the lives of patients worldwide.”
Khalil joined Novartis in May 2020 after helping build Gene Network Sciences, a healthcare data analytics company that changed its name to GNS Healthcare during her two-decade journey there, which was bookmarked by multiple years as chief commercial officer. GNS is now known as Aitia.
Also on her résumé is an advisory role to the agricultural development arm of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and board director for Cropin, an AI company for farmers that is funded by the Microsoft founder’s philanthropic group. She sits on the board of Flagship Pioneering’s agriculture biotech startup Invaio Sciences and has been on the board of the nonprofit Accelerated Cure Project for Multiple Sclerosis.
She will head up Merck’s data & genome sciences outfit, the company said, which is tasked with the gamut of genetic, multi-omic and deep phenotypic data. The goal is to assess and investigate that trove of data to improve drug discovery and strengthen the pharma’s clinical development.
Last February, Khalil told Endpoints the AI revolution in drug R&D will take many “shots on goal.”
“We’re at a place now where we’re having many companies now do this, many biotech companies as well as pharmaceutical companies such as ourselves, take shots at doing this where there’s going to be a variety of approaches,” Khalil said. “And it’s not just about the AI, it’s really about how you make the entire thing work.”
As AI seeps into more nooks and crannies in Big Pharma, Merck has further entrenched itself with burgeoning companies in the space. That includes a three-drug pact with BigHat Biosciences, biologics creator Absci and cloud computing player Saama, which focuses on patient data.
The pharma giant also created a 10-month accelerator program for AI and machine learning biomedical startups last year as part of the Merck Digital Sciences Studio, which includes Deep Forest Sciences, Pepper Bio and others.
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to include GNS’ new name, Aitia.