Management Team

Dr Frank Mathias, Ph.D, Chief Executive Officer

Dr Frank Mathias has been Chief Executive Officer since April 2009, and was previously the Board Member responsible for Marketing and Business Development. Dr Mathias possesses around 20 years of experience in pharmaceutical marketing at management level with international companies, most recently with Amgen. Dr Mathias studied pharmacy at Paris VI University, earning his PhD in 1991. He began his industrial career in 1988 as International Product Manager with Hoechst AG in Frankfurt and in 1990 joined Albert-Roussel Pharma GmbH in Wiesbaden, first as a Pharmaceuticals Officer then as a Product Group Manager, finishing as Deputy Head of Marketing. In 1995, Dr Mathias launched the Anti-Infective Marketing Department at Hoechst Pharma in Frankfurt before moving to Servier Deutschland GmbH in Munich as Head of Marketing and thereafter as General Manager. In 2002, he joined Amgen GmbH, Munich, as Head of Marketing and took over as General Manager from 2003–2007.

Arnd Christ, Chief Financial Officer
Arnd Christ has been Chief Financial Officer at MediGene since April 2010. He has 15 years of international experience in business finance and management as well as mergers and acquisitions. During his tenure as Chief Financial Officer at the biotech company NovImmune SA, Geneva, Switzerland, the company successfully closed one of the largest private financing rounds (CHF 62.5 million) in the European biotech industry. Prior to joining NovImmune, Mr. Christ held the position as Chief Financial Officer of Probiodrug AG, Halle, for 5 years, where he was responsible for several fund raising rounds as well as for the successful closing of a major asset sale to OSI Pharmaceuticals Inc. Before joining Probiodrug AG, Arnd Christ was finance manager at several subsidiaries of the Hoechst Group in Germany and UK. Arnd Christ studied at the Julius-Maximilians-Universität in Würzburg and holds a degree in business administration.

Prof. Dr. Ernst-Ludwig Winnacker, co-founder of MediGene and Chairman of the Supervisory Board, serves as Secretary General of the Human Frontier Science Program Organization (HFSPO). Prof. Winnacker studied chemistry at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zurich) where he obtained his Ph.D. in organic chemistry in 1968. After postdoctoral work at the University of California in Berkeley and the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm from 1968 to 1972, he became assistant and DFG visiting professor at the Institute for Genetics at the University of Cologne. In 1977 he was appointed Associate Professor at the Institute of Biochemistry at the Ludwig Maximilians University of Munich where he became full professor in 1980. From 1984 to 1997, he was Director of the Laboratory of Molecular Biology, the University of Munich Gene Center. From 1984 to 1987, he was a member of the survey committee “Chances and Risks of gene technology”. From 1987 to 1993 he served as Vice President of the German Research Foundation (DFG) and from 1998 to 2006 he was President. From 2003 to 2004 he also chaired the European Heads of Research Councils (EUROHORCs) and from 2000 to 2004 was member of the European Life Science Group established by Commissioner for Research, Philippe Busquin. He served as Secretary General of the European Research Council (ERC) from 2007 to 2009.In July 2009, Prof. Winnacker  was appointed Secretary General of the International Human Frontier Science Program Organisation. Moreover, he is the Vice President of the Alexander von Humboldt foundation, and holds seats in several other foundations and boards.