
Our 3rd annual UK biopharma event tops this week — on Zoom — with José Baselga, top biotech CEOs and a look at the global financial scene
The first few years of Pascal Soriot’s reign as CEO of AstraZeneca were tough to watch, at times. Setbacks were more common than breakthroughs, and its inability to finish its new headquarters building in Cambridge, UK, seemed emblematic of its inner confusion. True, Soriot had inherited the worst pipeline in Big Pharma, but investors fretted for some time when the company would get back on track.

Through it all, the company steadily built up key oncology franchises, brought in Merck as a major partner and narrowed its pipeline to focus on better prospects. And Soriot achieved his longstanding promise to replace steadily dwindling revenues with a growth picture.
Close to 2 years ago Soriot recruited José Baselga to run the oncology side of the business while Mene Pangalos steered the rest. And since the reorganization there have been high profile deals, new approvals and a repositioning for the drugs of the future.
Tomorrow I’ll be talking with Baselga about the future of oncology R&D at AstraZeneca at our 3rd annual UK biopharma summit, co-hosted by Nooman Haque at Silicon Valley Bank. What are the combinations Baselga’s most intrigued by? How did the Daiichi-Sankyo deals get done, and what do they tell us about the next round of pacts? And much more.
This year, because we’re on Zoom, I’m looking for a more global audience to check out this showcase on the Golden Triangle.
You’ll also have a chance to hear from Eliot Forster, Bahija Jallal, John Beadle, Chris Martin and Adrian Rawcliffe about UK R&D in a time of Covid-19, with some insider perspectives on how this has been playing out from a transatlantic perspective and where we go from here.
And Nooman will follow up with a look at how more increasingly porous international financial markets have benefited biotech in the UK, Europe and beyond. His guests: Anat Naschitz, Brian Silver, Katie Ellias, Graham Walmsley and Stephanie Léouzon.
Please join us tomorrow for the full slate, or choose any particular part you’d like to tune in on. We’ll have time for questions from the audience during each event. You can see the full schedule right here. I hope to see you there.