About us
Convert Pharmaceuticals is a preclinical stage drug development company that is building a proprietary drug pipeline exploiting tumor microenvironment specific factors for therapeutic benefit.
Convert’s lead product is a hypoxia activated prodrug (HAP). Hypoxia constitutes a therapeutic obstacle as it promotes the development of resistance to conventional anti-cancer treatments. Convert Pharmaceuticals combines proprietary insights in the tumor microenvironment with expertise in drug and biomarker development to develop effective and well-tolerated HAPs. Advanced biomarker research allows detailed stratification to treat well-defined patient populations.
Convert builds on the expertise in tumor hypoxia and cancer treatment of Dr. Prof. Philippe Lambin, together with that of the pioneering scientists, Assoc. Prof. Adam Patterson and Dr. Jeff Smaill of the Auckland Cancer Society Research Centre, at the University of Auckland, New Zealand.
Team
Philippe Lambin, M.D., Ph.D.
Chief Scientific Advisor, Co-founder
Philippe Lambin is a Clinician, Radiation Oncologist, “ERC advanced & twice ERC PoC grant laureate” respectively from 2016, 2017 & 2020 and pioneer in translational research with a focus on tumour hypoxia and Decision Support Systems. He has a PhD in Molecular Radiation Biology and is Professor at the University of Maastricht (Precision Medicine & Radiation Oncology) and at the University of Eindhoven (“Functional Imaging”, until 2011). He is co-author of more than 526 peer reviewed scientific papers (Hirsch Index: 100 Google scholar), co-inventor of more than 20 patent families (filed or submitted) of which 10 are in the (pre)commercialization phase and (co) promoter of more than 60 completed PhD’s (2 with cum laude). Prof. P. Lambin also has extensive experience with clinical trials. He is one of the co-inventor of “Radiomics”, “Clinical Decision Support Systems”, “Distributed learning” from federated databases, genetically modified bacteria for cancer treatment, the combination of immunocytokines with radiation and Lymphocytes-Sparing Radiotherapy (LSRT).
Ludwig Dubois, Ph.D.
Chief Scientific Officer
The Chief Scientific Officer of our company is a doctor in Biomedical Sciences and an expert in pre-clinical studies concerning tumour hypoxia with more than 90 publications on this subject.
Jan Theys, Ph.D.
Chief Technology Officer
Jan, our Chief Technology Officer is a Doctor in Medical Sciences specialised in use of prokaryotic living medicine, tumour microenvironment and metabolism. He has >20 years of research experience with an extensive publication record in the field (h-index 36).
Jorge de Almeida, Ph.D.
Clinical Project Manager
Dr. Almeida is bioscientist who was trained in Biology, Microbiology, and Genetics at University of Lisbon in 2005. He obtained his PhD in Immunology at University Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris 2009. After that, Dr. Almeida worked as Postdoc with the National Institutes of Health in Maryland, USA from 2009 to 2013. Since 2021 he is our Clinical Project Manager at Convert.
Currently, Dr. Almeida is leading the clinical development and coordination of the Phase-1 clinical trial of CP-506.
Brice Van Eeckhout
Chief Operating Officer
With a strong background in Business Engineering and International Management and experience in building up and managing start-up, Brice is an entrepreneur in MedTech. He has the position of COO in Convert Pharmaceuticals.
Investors
Convert Pharmaceutical is privately held and backed by Wallonia – DG06 and COMPACT grants.