About Us
Iktos was founded in 2016 by Quentin Perron, Nicolas Do Huu, and Yann Gaston-Mathé, with the aim of developing an innovative and user-friendly technology platform for deep learning-based de novo drug design, leveraging a proprietary algorithm developed by Quentin and Nicolas. This proprietary technology enables, using existing data, the design of molecules that are optimized in silico to meet all the success criteria of a small molecule discovery project. Today, Iktos is a leading player in AI-based generative chemistry having delivered value in 50-plus real world research collaborations with some of the most eminent pharma companies globally.
Did you know?
‘Iktos’ stands for ‘God of Dream Catcher’ in the Native American mythology. A lot of terms used at Iktos have Native American origins.
Soon after inception, Iktos started its first collaboration project in 2017. An initial success and first real world validation of the technology was achieved in 2018 in a collaboration with Servier. In 2019, Iktos established its presence in North America by incorporating Iktos Inc. and secured seed funding, as well as non-dilutive finances to grow its AI for de novo drug design technology and software. In the same year, Iktos won its first client for Makya, a SaaS generative AI software platform. In 2020, Iktos released Spaya, Iktos synthesis planning software, and made it available publicly for users to use and evaluate. Over the past few years, Iktos has won various grant competitions and raised equity from a pool of private investors. In 2021, Iktos received a large non-dilutive funding from Bpifrance for its robotics platform. In March 2023, Iktos raised €15.5M in a Series A round co-led by M Ventures and Debiopharm Innovation Fund with participation from Omnes Capital. In a short span of time, Iktos has emerged as a leading player in AIDD and has successfully delivered multiple projects for global bio-pharma collaborators, thanks to its growing team, comprising of 60 talented individuals spread across France, the UK and the US.
Founders And Board
Yann Gaston-Mathé
Co-Founder & CEO; Chairman of the Board
MS Ecole Polytechnique Paris and AgroParisTech. 20+ years experience in pharma R&D, strategic consulting and entrepreneurship in biotech.
Co-founder and CEO, Yann leads the development of Iktos with his knowledge of the pharmaceutical industry and a broad understanding of methods, approaches and tools of data science.
Quentin Perron
Co-Founder & CSO; Board Observer
PhD in organometallic chemistry from University of Geneva. Medicinal chemist, skilled data scientist.
Co-founder and CSO, Quentin plays a key role in the strategic steering of Iktos’s R&D and portfolio development and supervision of project delivery for partners and customers.
Nicolas Do Huu
Co-Founder & CTO; Board Member
PhD in Artificial Intelligence. Several years experience in software development and R&D. Contributed to the emerging data science field by creating distributed computation platform for Big Data processing.
Co-founder and CTO at Iktos, Nicolas leads the technological developments of the company.
Bertrand Ducrey
Board Member
Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Sciences from the University of Lausanne, Switzerland.
Bertrand is the CEO of Debiopharm and Senior Vice-Chairman of the Life Science activities of Après-demain. His work in various roles has contributed to two blockbuster therapies for cancer patients, oxaliplatin and triptorelin, along with a potential 3rd blockbuster drug currently in phase III research in Head & Neck cancer with an international partner.
Nadiya Ishnazarova
Board Member
Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics from the University of Oxford.
Nadiya joined M Ventures Biotechnology team covering Healthcare and Life Sciences investments as an Associate in 2021. She has strong experience in strategy and transformation for corporate healthcare clients, health systems, providers, pharma and digital health clients in EMEA, Asia Pacific and Emerging Markets.
Fabien Collangettes
Board Observer
Engineering degree from CentraleSupélec and a Master of Science in Finance from the Imperial College (UK).
Fabien joined Omnes’s Investment Team in January 2017 and was appointed Director in 2021. He actively invests in TechBio and Deeptech companies and sits at the supervisory board of companies such as SeqOne Genomics, Qubit Pharmaceuticals, Quandela, Sekoia.io.
Christian Uhrich
Board Observer
MBA from Mannheim Business School, Germany, and a Diploma in Computer Science and Business Administration (Business Informatics) from Cooperative State University Karlsruhe, Germany.
Christian joined M Ventures in August 2019 as Head of Strategy and currently serves as a Principal in the Biotechnology team. Prior to joining M Ventures, Christian worked at Merck KGaA, where he focused on impactful strategy-related projects across all business sectors of the Merck Group.
Vincent Gerusz
Board Observer
Ph.D. in Chemistry from Stanford University. 25+ years of professional experience in drug discovery and scientific leadership in the pharma industry.
Vincent is the co-inventor of several new antibacterials and oncology drugs put in clinical development. Co-author of more than 50 publications and patent applications, he currently serves as Head of Medicinal Chemistry at Debiopharm.
Jérôme Dhamelincourt
Board Observer
Graduated from Lausanne Hospitality Management school
Jérôme joined the Private Equity investment company MI3 S.A. in Luxembourg in 2014, where he operates as Investment Manager and Director. Previously, he was the Chief Financial Officer for the Belgian startup Rouge Tomate in Brusselles and New York and then Management Controller for the Groupe Castel in West Africa.
Management Team
Avirup Bose
Chief Business Officer
PhD in Chemistry, +18 years of experience in drug discovery portfolio strategy and management and business development at Novartis.
Formerly VP, and Head of Business Development at Chinook Therapeutics, overseeing all business development aspects until its acquisition by Novartis AG in August 2023. Now, at Iktos, leading the global business development team and contributing to the company’s strategy as a member of the executive committee.
Cindy Serriere
Chief Financial Officer
Master’s degree in Accounting-Control-Audit and Business & Tax law.
Over 15 years of experience in finance, including 8 years as a finance executive in the software industry. Strong experience in company growth, international development, entrepreneurship, and fundraising. Now CFO at Iktos.
Arnaud Fillon
Chief Legal Counsel
PhD in law. Over 20 years of experience as an in-house legal counsel in bio-pharmaceutical industry and technology transfer offices. Extensive experience in negotiating and drafting international contracts, and organizing legal departments. Master 2 lecturer in several French universities. Now Chief Legal Counsel for Iktos.
Alexis Denis
SVP, Head of Drug Discovery
PhD in organic chemistry, +30 years of experience in Drug Discovery and Medicinal Chemistry.
Alexis contributed to the successful discovery and development of >15 clinical candidates going to Phase I and beyond. Now SVP, Head of Drug Discovery at Iktos.
Philip Laut
VP, Head of US Operations, Sales & Business Development
MS in Materials Sciences & Engineering from Université de Montpellier and MBA in Marketing from Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business. More than 30 years of sales, and business development activities, including more than ten years of successful partnerships with pharmaceutical industries worldwide. Now VP-Head of BD, Sales & Operations, USA
Hideyoshi Fuji
VP, Japan Operations and Business Development
PhD in Pharmaceutical Sciences. 13 years experience in pharma R&D at Astellas Pharma as an expert in computational chemistry and chemoinformatics. Now, Representative Director of Iktos K.K., VP Japan Operations and Business Development at Iktos, leading Iktos’s business expansion in APAC region.
Jean Christophe Meillon
Head of Robotics Lab
PhD in organic chemistry. Research Associate at the University of Cambridge. Senior Research Scientist at Idenix Pharmaceuticals. Co-founder and Medicinal Chemistry Director at Oxeltis. 20 years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry. Now, Head of Robotics, Iktos.
Brice Hoffmann
Head of Computational Chemistry
PhD and post-doc in Bioinformatics. Spearheaded the development of Iktos structure-based generative modeling technology and pipeline. Head of Iktos modeling team.
Hamza Tajmouati
Head of AI Research and Data Science
Master’s in Applied Mathematics and Computer Science. Key contributor to the development of Iktos generative modeling technology. Lead developer of Iktos retrosynthesis technology.
Abderraouf El Gasser
Head of Platform Development
Master’s in Software Engineering. 15 years experience as CTO, successful experience of software product development. In charge of the software development team.
Christopher Housseman
Head of Medicinal Chemistry
PhD in chemistry. Over 12 years of experience of medicinal chemistry. Project leader in a med chem project that successfully delivered a drug candidate. Now leads the Med Chem team at Iktos.
Marion Laguette
Director, Strategic Planning and Corporate Development
Engineering degree from Ecole Polytechnique and Master’s in Applied Biosciences & Biotechnology from Imperial College London. In charge of strategic planning & corporate development at Iktos.
Dara Phonekeo
Office and HR Manager
Degree in Communication from RMIT Melbourne. Over 10 years of experience as an Executive Assistant and Office Manager. Ran business as a fitness coach, certified yoga and Pilates teacher. Responsible for the smooth functioning of the company.