News

Arkadii Vaisburg

Ph.D., Executive director of Medicinal Chemistry

Arkadii is the site head of the North American Division of SpiroChem (Cyclenium Pharma, Montreal, Canada). He is responsible for the site operation directing multiple teams of scientists working on platform, medicinal chemistry and custom synthesis projects, as well as supporting the SpiroChem business development team in contacting, soliciting and arranging meetings with potential clients.

He has more than 25 years of drug discovery and development experience in the areas of infectious diseases, ophthalmology and oncology. Prior to joining SpiroChem Arkadii served as Executive Director at MethylGene/Mirati Therapeutics in Montreal where he and his coworkers delivered clinical compounds, Glesatinib and Sitravatinib to treat cancer; and most recently as Senior Director at NuChem Sciences, a well-established North American CRO.

Arkadii holds a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from N.D.Zelinsky Institute of Organic Chemistry, Russian Academy of Sciences.

Thomas Fessard

Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer & Chief Scientific Officer

Thomas studied chemistry in France (ENSC, Montpellier) and the UK (UMIST, Manchester) and obtained a PhD degree from the university of Nottingham, UK.

After research appointments at the School of Pharmacy in Nottingham and ETH Zürich, Thomas joined Lipideon Biotechnology AG in 2007. As Head of the Drug Discovery and Chemistry, he lead a multi-disciplinary team that discovered a candidate for pre-clinical investigation (Non-Systemic Cholesterol Absorption Inhibitor).

In 2011, Thomas co-founded SpiroChem AG, Swiss fine chemicals company and serves as CEO of the company.

Thomas has several years of experience in the management of R&D projects, including medicinal chemistry, design of innovative building blocks for drug discovery and development of new process routes.