Our leadership

Lord David Prior

Independent Non-Executive Chairman

Lord Prior is Deputy Chairman UK and Global Senior Advisor at Lazard.  

He was educated at Cambridge University and subsequently qualified as a barrister. He trained in finance at Lehman Brothers and Lazard Freres in New York before holding a number of senior positions within the industrial sector, including British Steel, where he was Commercial Director.   He was elected MP for North Norfolk in 1997 and became CEO and Deputy Chair of the Conservative Party.

He served as Chair of Norfolk and Norwich University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust from 2002 – 2012 before becoming Chair of the Care Quality Commission. In 2015, he was appointed Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Health and created a Life Peer. In December 2016, he was appointed as Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, with specific responsibility for developing industrial strategy. He stepped down from this role in October 2017 to become Chair of University College London Hospitals and subsequently became Chair of NHS England, a Director of Genomics England and a member of the UK Life Sciences Council to March 2022.  

He is currently Chair of Protas, a not for profit clinical trials business, Chair of the Cambridge Life Sciences Council, Chair of Science Capital Imperial, a venture fund aligned with Imperial College, and a member of the Novo Nordisk Sustainability Advisory Council.

Professor Trevor Jones CBE

Independent Non-Executive Director

Trevor was appointed to the Board in October 2015 as a Non-Executive Director and appointed Independent Non-Executive Chairman in March 2021. Trevor has over 40 years’ distinguished experience in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry as well as in academia. He is a member of the Boards of Techimmune LLC and Ascension Healthcare plc and a Visiting Professor at King’s College London; he holds honorary degrees and Gold Medals from seven universities. Previously, Trevor held significant roles in industry including Director of Allergan Inc. from 2005 to 2015 and R&D Director of The Wellcome Foundation from 1987 to 1994, where he was responsible for the development of AZT, Zovirax, Lamictal, Malarone and other medicines. Trevor has also held a number of advisory and regulatory roles including Director General of the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (“ABPI”); board member of the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (“EFPIA”) and the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers & Associations (“IFPMA”); a member of the UK Government regulatory agency The Medicines Commission; a member of the UK Government Pharmaceutical Industry Ministerial Strategy Working Group on Pharmaceuticals; an advisor to the Cabinet Office on the Human Genome Project; a member of the Prime Minister’s Task Force on the Competitiveness of the Pharmaceutical Industry (“PICTF”); and Chair of the Government Advisory Group on Genetics Research.

Michael Bretherton

Independent Non-Executive Director

Michael was appointed to the Board as a Non-Executive Director in February 2020 and subsequently took on the additional role as Interim Chief Financial Officer with effect from December 2021-September 2023. Michael has many years of financial and commercial experience as a Director of numerous AIM quoted companies including DeepMatter Group plc, Tissue Regenix Group plc, Nanoco Group plc and Ceres Power Holdings plc. Michael has a degree in Economics from Leeds University and is a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales. His early career included working as an accountant and manager with PriceWaterhouse for seven years in London and Abu Dhabi. Michael is currently also Chief Executive Officer of Sarossa plc, Chairman of Adams plc and Hardy plc and a Non-Executive Director of Blake Holdings Limited and ORA Limited.

Jeremy Punnett

Independent Non-Executive Director

Jeremy was appointed to the Board as a Non-Executive Director in July 2024. Jeremy is a fund manager at M&G Investment Management Limited (“M&G”) where he is responsible for pre-IPO and growth equity investing, having previously worked on corporate governance and public and private transactions for the public equities business. Since joining M&G in 2019, Jeremy has been involved in numerous private and public investment transactions. He led the April 2024 investment by M&G in e-therapeutics and was involved in the previous private placement.

Before joining M&G, Jeremy began his career as a strategy consultant for KPMG and PA Consulting, later working for a private shipowner in a variety of strategic roles and running a listed oil and gas shipping investment trust. Jeremy is a Chartered Financial Analyst and holds an M.Sc in Economic History from the London School of Economics, an MBA from Manchester Business School, and an M.Com in International Business from the University of Auckland.

Ali Mortazavi

Chief Executive Officer

Ali was appointed to the Board as Executive Chairman in February 2020 and Chief Executive Officer in October 2020, retaining his position as Chairman, and subsequently split these roles in March 2021 to continue as Chief Executive Officer. Ali has extensive experience in the biotechnology sector and financial markets. His most recent roles include CEO of Silence Therapeutics plc, from 2012 to 2018, as well as a founder shareholder of Evolution Group, a UK-based investment bank, from 2001 to 2008.

Ali is an experienced investor in small companies and has held numerous declarable stakes in listed/private biotechnology and technology companies. Ali holds a BSc in Computer science, an International Master of chess and a former professional chess player. During his chess career, Ali was actively involved in the development of chess databses and the analysis of chess positions using chess computer engines.