Amrik Basran PhD, BSc

Dr Amrik Basran has over 14 years’ experience of both the biotech and pharma industries. He completed his degree and PhD at the University of Leicester and has a background in protein biochemistry/engineering. He then spent 6 years as a post-doctoral researcher at the Institute of Biotechnology, Cambridge University isolating novel bacterial pathways involved with the metabolism of illicit drugs and high explosives. In 2002, Amrik then joined Domantis, a start-up biotech company based in Cambridge developing domain antibodies (dAbs), a novel antibody fragment technology.

As Director of Protein Sciences, he was responsible for characterising the lead dAbs from early discovery for their suitability for drug development, supporting pre-clinical evaluations and tech transfer to CMOs. Domantis was acquired by GSK in 2006, after which he became Head of Topical Delivery (Biopharm Discovery Unit), supporting the development of biotherapeutics across the GSK portfolio.

The group focused on discovering and developing a wide range of therapeutic antibodies, dAbs and proteins for delivery into the eye, skin and lung. This included developing formulation and delivery strategies for biotherapeutics for Phase I clinical studies. Amrik left GSK in 2012 and joined Avacta in 2013 as Chief Scientific Officer to develop the Affimer platform for therapeutic use, focusing on immuno-oncology where there is a high unmet medical need for new novel drugs to improve the long term clinical outcome for cancer patients.