Alex Szidon, PhD

Vice President and Head of Business Development, gRED at Genentech

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As Vice President and Head of Business Development for gRED (Genentech Research and Early Development), Alex Szidon works with gRED leadership on business development strategies and is accountable for Search and Evaluation and leading partnering transactions in support of Genentech’s Research and Early Development portfolio.

Alex joined Genentech from Merck’s Pacific Business Development and Licensing Team accessing innovation throughout Asia, the western U.S. and Canada. In that role, Alex and his team augmented Merck’s pipeline through acquisitions and collaborations with biotechnology companies focusing on developing new modalities for therapy, new technologies and new protein engineering platforms to increase precision of treatment.

Prior to Merck, Alex led an Alliances group at the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research in Cambridge, MA and Emeryville, CA after initially supporting asset transactions for the New Indication Discovery Unit and technology platform transactions for the Translational Sciences group.

Earlier in his career, Alex founded biopharma company Zafgen, was an early employee at DARA Biosciences, and served as Director of Business Development in the Office of Technology Development at the Harvard Medical School.

Alex lives in the Bay Area with his wife and three children.