MassBio is partnering with Novo Nordisk on October 29, 2024, to host 2024 Novo Nordisk Pharma Day®. MassBio’s Pharma Days® are unparalleled opportunities for emerging innovators to learn from and connect with world-leading biopharmaceutical companies. Novo Nordisk, founded in 1923 and headquartered in Denmark, is a leading global healthcare company that is driving change to defeat serious chronic diseases by pioneering scientific breakthroughs, expanding access to medicines, and working to prevent and ultimately cure disease.
The following is an interview with John McDonald, Corporate Vice President, Global Head of Business Development and M&A at Novo Nordisk. To learn more about Novo Nordisk’s approach to innovation and partnering, register for 2024 Novo Nordisk Pharma Day® on Tuesday, October 29, 2024 in the MassBioHub.
What does innovation mean to Novo Nordisk?
Innovation is at the core of Novo Nordisk. For more than 100 years, we have been translating the unmet medical needs of people living with a serious chronic disease into innovative medicines, and we have always worked closely with scientists and medical institutions to jointly pioneer possible new therapeutic approaches. In recent years, we have increased our focus on sourcing and leveraging external innovation through numerous partnerships and acquisitions, from early target discovery and research through to clinical stage. Ultimately, we believe that by working together as partners, with our respective strengths, expertise and capabilities, we can create more value and better outcomes for patients together than either of us could alone.
What are Novo Nordisk’s priorities for partnering?
In our business development activities, we have a clear focus on our main therapy areas – first and foremost Diabetes and Obesity, and in a more targeted way Cardiovascular Disease, Rare Blood Disorders and other serious chronic diseases, including MASH or CKD. In all these areas, we are looking for partners with expertise in novel modalities and technologies. We want to connect with innovators who are pioneering novel targets, new mechanisms of action and potentially disease-modifying compounds that can address unmet medical needs and potentially change the lives of people living with a serious chronic disease. We are also interested in options that advance our existing core capabilities and help us establish new technology platforms.
Partnerships are clearly important to Novo Nordisk. How does Novo Nordisk support the companies/innovators that it works with?
As a highly value-based and purpose-driven company, we bring the same mindset and our essential values of excellence, openness and respect to every partnership we enter. We believe in relationships based on trust and complementary capabilities. Our partners collaborate seamlessly with our highly engaged scientists, technical and commercial experts – and are supported throughout each collaboration by our dedicated teams in business development, integration and alliance management. We have also established a number of initiatives focused on specific types of partnerships. One example is our Boston-based Bio Innovation Hub – an R&D unit designed to bring life science innovation to life through collaborative partnerships with biotech companies and academics, and to co-create breakthrough ideas that could one day change the way we treat disease.
Author Bio
John McDonald joined Novo Nordisk in October 2018 and currently is Corporate Vice President, Global Head of Business Development and M&A. He is also the site head for Novo Nordisk’s Boston Office.
In his career, John has led or participated in the evaluating, structuring and negotiating of numerous mergers and acquisitions, licenses and strategic alliances. He served as Biogen’s Vice President, Corporate Development and Strategy from 2011 to 2018, and as a managing director at MPM Capital from 2006 to 2011, one of the world’s largest science-dedicated venture capital firms, focusing on company formation and supporting portfolio company business development efforts. Working with Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Inc. from April 2000 through May 2006, John was Vice President of Business Development. Prior to that, John worked at both Genentech, Inc. and Genzyme Corporation where he led or participated in various business development transactions. John holds a J.D. from the University of California Law San Francisco, and an M.B.A., Beta Gamma Sigma, and a B.S., Phi Beta Kappa, from the Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley.