Yacine acted as Regulatory Evaluator of drugs registration dossiers, and as Permanent Secretary of the Economic Committee in charge of Drugs Pricing at the General Directorate of Pharmacy and Health Equipments – Ministry of Health. He is Second Secretary of the Algerian Society of Regulatory Affairs & Pharmacoeconomics, and Regulatory Advisor to Algeria’s Ministry of Health.

Yacine actually holds the position of Assistant General Director in charge of Business Development Projects at Institut Pasteur of Algeria, a non-profit organization involved with R&D in the field of infectious, immune and neglected diseases. He is also Associate Professor in Pharmaceutical Analytical Chemistry and Scientific Board Member at Medical Sciences Faculty of Algiers.

Yacine has been a keynote speaker and panelist across various healthcare regional and international congresses.

Science and Law Graduate with 30 years of experience in healthcare, cancer research, pharmaceutical industry and CRO, across a wide range of roles including developing and implementing clinical development strategies for biosimilars and complex generics. Experience in all aspects of biosimilar development including study design and regulatory agency discussions (EMA, FDA, MENA, GCC, Australia, India, Japan and S. Korea). In the last few years have worked with the developing regions and conducted several meetings with MENA and GCC Regulatory Agencies to educate and better understand their expectations licensing biosimilars; also supporting them in implementing clinical trial regulations and educating potential investigators in the region. Worked on over 15 biosimilar molecules across a range of products and indications, including ESAs, Filgrastims, Heparins, Insulins and monoclonal antibodies in various capacity including consulting, regulatory and clinical strategies, feasibility and supporting study delivery across all phase of development (phase I to IV).

1980 – 1994 Guy’s Hospital Medical School followed by hospital medicine and clinical research in London, Birmingham, and Manchester 1994 -1999 Senior Medical Assessor Pharmacovigilance Assessment Group UK Medicines Control Agency 1999 – 2005 Senior Medical Director– Parexel Scientific and Medical Services 2005 – 2007 Deputy Qualified Person for pharmacovigilance for Janssen Cilag Since July 2007 Principal Consultant in Pharmacovigilance and Drug Safety with NDA Regulatory Science Ltd.

Director of ISoP Secretariat Ltd and Advisory Board Member of ISoP Vice President Pharmacovigilance & Drug Safety in the Alliance Clinical Research Excellence and Safety (ACRES) and Chair of UK Pharmaceutical Human Factors & Ergonomics group

Currently Leeza is lecturing at the London School of Economics (Department of Health Policy). Her research interests are in methodology of health technology assessment, clinical trial design, drug pricing and evidence based medicine.

Between 2014 and 2018 she has been leading Scientific Advice at the National Institute for Health and Care Excellent (NICE). She chaired over 150 advisory meetings at NICE and at the EMA (European Medicines Agency) and closely collaborated with EUnetHTA and MHRA. At NICE, Leeza provided methodological, operational, and strategic leadership for the team which became well-known internationally. During those years Leeza represented NICE as a chief analyst at the Department of Health Appraisal Alignment Working Group. Prior to joining NICE, Leeza did a post-doc at Warwick Medical school and worked as Principal Economist at the public sector consultancy, Optimity Matrix.

Leeza holds a PhD in Systems Engineering, MSc in Technology Management and BA in Economics and International Affairs. She has given over 200 talks and lectured on graduate and undergraduate programmes in the US and the UK.

Professional Experience:
Nov 2017-uptodate:
Head of market access, North Africa (Egypt, Libya, Sudan and Jordan), Janssen Pharmaceuticals.

July 2015- Nov 2017
HEMAR (Health Economics, Market Access and Reimbursement) Manager North Africa (Egypt, Libya, Sudan and Jordan), Janssen Pharmaceuticals.

Oct 2014-July 2015: 
Senior Regional HEMAR (Health Economics, Market Access and Reimbursement) and Regulatory Associate, North Africa (Egypt, Libya, Sudan and Jordan), Janssen Pharmaceuticals.

September 2012-Oct 2014: 
Technical office Manager CAPA (Central Administration of Pharmaceutical Affairs).

December 2012- Oct 2014:
Member of the pharmaco-economics steering committee, CAPA.

October 2012-Oct 2014:
Supply chain Reform program management team member, MOH.

October 2012- Oct 2014:
Executive manager for the e-CTD (electronic common technical document) implementation project

January 2014- Oct 2014:
The Egyptian regulatory counterpart, AFRA (African Regional Cooperative Agreement For Research, Development And Training Related To Nuclear Science And Technology), (IAEA) International Atomic Energy Agency

August 2009-August 2010
Head of Biocides Registration Department, Ministry of Health, Egypt

2009-2010
Labeling and naming committee Member for human drugs, food supplements and biological products

2004-2009 
Registration Specialist, human Pharmaceutical product.

2004-2005
Pharmacology Instructor, Faculty of Pharmacy October 6th University, Cairo.

Publications:
Elsisi GH, Ragab S, Ashraf R, Elmahdawy M. Cost-Effectiveness of Drug-Eluting Stents versus Bare Metal Stents in Egyptian Diabetic Patients. Poster Presentation PCV108 at ISPOR 16th Annual European Congress 2-6 November 2013; Dublin, Ireland.

Petra graduated from the University of Goettingen/ Germany with Diploma in 1980 and with Ph.D. in 1983. She joined Abbott Laboratories in the same year.
Petra has more than 35 years of experience in Regulatory Affairs and Quality Systems for Medical Devices, currently responsible for all international regulatory matters, medical event reporting, risk management, managing translation for 29 languages and labeling activities at Abbott Diagnostics Division. She has experience in building Quality Management System according 9001 and 13485 and has passed a lead auditor training in 1997. Since then she has used that knowledge in training, setting up a QMS or consulting in that field internally and externally.
Petra is retired from Abbott since April 2019 and is working as an independent Consultant.

Andreas is a Fintech, Telecommunication and Blockchain professional with over 20 years of experience. Andreas has worked for large multinational companies such as Vodafone, News Corporation International and Siemens Communications. He has been successfully running MWAN Mobile for the last 8 years with some notable clients like Del Monte, Vodafone and STC, just to name a few. In the last 3 years, he has been involved in and developed solutions on top of the decentralised Blockchain protocols. He has also spoken at several industry events to date in the technology, Smart Cities and Innovation space.

Andrew Rippon has been involved in crypto currencies since 2012 when he authored work on crypto to fiat exchanges. In 2015 he also wrote early work on blockchains and government. Today he is an independent blockchain consultant, crypto finance and ICO advisor. He has advised project ranging from sport to corporate services. He is currently advising Fiduxa, an ICO launching soon to revolutionize the recruitment industry. Andrew is also the interim COO of Ubex, an AI and blockchain disruption of programmatic advertising.

Among his current interests, Andrew is working on models to leverage crypto currencies within consumer focused applications, including work on personal data, gamification, stable coins and asset management.

In his recent past Andrew was the Blockchain Lead at NXN, developing technology at the intersection of crypto currencies and the underlying utility of blockchain. Andrew is also involved in startups within the space, having advised several on technology development, hardening and governance. Recently Andrew has been advisor for Goal Bonanza, BoatPilot, EVEN, Eggs and several other ICOs.

As leader of blockchain practice at NXN, Andrew put in place consortia to deliver complex solutions and is currently working on blockchain use cases for government and real estate customers. Solutions in these spaces are all about creating end to end, true digital workflows that allow for greater efficiency and make a step change in customer satisfaction. Examples of such use cases can be seen in the automation of government services towards citizens and residents. Equally, processes within real estate development concerning asset management, sales and tenant management can make a digitally powered step change.

Andrew has led initiatives to bring the power of internet technologies into business and government spheres since their inception and continues to work at the cutting edge, now specializing on blockchain and distributed ledger technologies. He has worked on many consumer applications within gaming, entertainment and practical tools. Recently he has worked on Initial Coin Offerings (ICO) with startups, advising on technology selection, set up, structure and execution of the ICO.

Having graduated from Staffordshire University in the UK with a business focused degree and gained his deep technical knowledge afterwards, Andrew has a keen eye for the impact of technology on business value, solving organizational problems and creating new ways of operating to advance the achievement of strategic goals.

Brian de Francesca is a Johns Hopkins educated expert in the use of digitalization and connectivity to improve healthcare quality, access and efficiency. Most specifically, in the use of platform technologies to increase, optimize and improve healthcare human resources – for which there is a significant global need. This has broad implications on healthcare staffing and facility design, development, number, location and the scope of services to be offered.
Brian was first exposed to the tremendous potential of “digitalization and connectivity” in 1993, with the success of the world’s first tele-radiology program in his home town of Baltimore, Maryland at the Veterans Administration Medical Center. Brian has been a “super user” of digitalization and connectivity (aka – telemedicine) ever since. He was deeply involved with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce e-commerce IBEX (International Business Exchange) project and conducted the some of the first pilots of Digital Pathology. His company participated in the “Whole System Demonstrator Project” in the U.K., which was the largest randomized control trial of telehealth and telecare in the world and demonstrated the significant benefits of telemedicine; and also, remotely monitored over 35,000 patients in Europe for post discharge and chronic disease management. Brian has won awards for his TeleStroke program in Asia, Tele-medical education programs in Africa, the Frost and Sullivan 2018 “Telemedicine Leadership Award” and the 201 International Life Sciences Awards for ‘Best Healthcare Staffing Solutions Provider,” for the services provide Ver2 in human resource capacity building, optimizing and quality improving. Brian maintains a full roster of international speaking and writing engagements, covering a wide array of healthcare topics and most recently appeared on the cover of the July issue of “Middle East Medical” magazine.
Brian has over 20 years international healthcare experience. He lived in Thailand for over a decade, where in addition to founding the region’s first biomedical engineering company – Asia Bio Systems; he also worked with Bangkok Hospital and Bumrungrad Hospital – both of which receive large numbers of medical tourists each year that benefited from his innovative use of telemedicine to support inbound and outbound medical travel. He later worked for Johns Hopkins in Abu Dhabi, where he was responsible for a wide network of healthcare facilities. It was during this period that he refined his vision for a Virtual Healthcare Service Platform, which eventually became Ver2. He is an advisor to :IRYO – a European company that is developing one of the first cloud-based electronic health records, incorporating a full Blockchain technology foundation. He is an advocate for the formation of global research collaborative exchanges – to include not only humans, but synthetic inteligence (AI) as well. Brian is also an active member of The World Future Society.
In 2015, Brian founded Ver2 – an innovative telemedicine services platform, that received an Expo2020 Global Innovator’s Grant for its “Connecting Minds” medical education work in Africa. Ver2 was the first company in the world to successfully use Blockchain to support tele-medical education; and they are in the process of incorporating various artificial intelligence applications into their diagnostics platform modules. One of Brian’s personal goals, is to connect 700 refugee camps to healthcare and education resources over the Ver2 Platform.
Brian is a graduate of Johns Hopkins and Loyola Universities, a Fellow of The Advisory Board Company and holds a Certificate in Company Direction from “The Institute of Directors” (IOD). Brian presently resides in Dubai, UAE.