I have recently been appointed Chief Business Development Officer at Vectura Fertin Pharma. Prior to that I was the Global Business Development & Licensing Head (BD&L) in the Ophthalmology and Respiratory franchises at Novartis Pharma, AG, based in Basel. I have more than 20 years of pharmaceutical development and strategy leadership, having led BD&L efforts at Novartis across different therapeutic franchises (ophthalmology, respiratory, cardiovascular & metabolism, arthritis, bone and musculoskeletal diseases), as well as a proven track record in licensing deals and M&A. Before joining Novartis, I was responsible for External Pharmaceutical projects at Almirall (Barcelona, Spain). I hold a PhD in Drug Delivery and a 3-year Postdoctoral Research fellow at the Centre for Polymer Therapeutics (both at London School of Pharmacy, UK) and a BSc in Biochemistry from Keele University (UK). I am a board member in ProQR (Netherlands) and IRB (Barcelona) and member of the Women in Science committee at the Controlled Release Society.