Xanthus: Evolving business strategies

Fintan Walton talks to Mike Boss, Chief Business Officer, Xanthus Pharmaceuticals, about his role in the evolution of Xanthus, a biopharmaceutical company founded in 2001. After covering Mike's industry experience, Fintan and Mike discuss how Xanthus morphed from a personalised medicine company into a drug discovery firm, which today has five promising molecules in its product pipeline. All of the company's products are focused on the treatment of cancer and autoimmune disorders. With successful backing from a group of venture capital firms and US$25 M secured in a recent funding round, Xanthus is in a strong position. Although the firm's business strategy was originally to in-license small novel molecules and advance them to a stage where partnering can be assessed, the acquisition of new molecules has led the firm to adapt this strategy according to the stage of the product in development. For one of Xanthus' molecules, this will involve taking the product through clinical trials.

Michael A. Boss PhD, MBA

Chief Business Officer, Mike has 25 years experience in the biotechnology industry and is well known for his leading role on the first patent for recombinant antibodies (the “Boss Patent”). Since his role at Celltech, Mike’s career has flourished. After co-founding Oros Instruments, a firm that developed and manufactured protein purification equipment in 1987, he joined Genica Pharmaceuticals in 1991, first as Vice President of Research and Development, and later in 1997, was named Vice President of Operations. Following his time at Genica, Mike held the position of Vice President at Elan.

Mike graduated from the University of London with a BSc and PhD in immunology and an MBA from the London Business School. He completed his postdoctoral fellowship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) with Nobel Laureate Dr David Baltimore.