Management
The founding and management team of Valerius
Valerius is led by a team with proven track-records in biopharmaceutical development and finance
Dr. Andreas Herrmann
Founder and CEO
Dr. Andreas Herrmann has 25 years of experience in biopharmaceutical and biosimilar development.
As a serial entrepreneur, Dr. Herrmann successfully (co-)founded several biotech companies. From 2013–2016, he built up Alvotech, a leading biosimilars company based in Iceland with a four product pipeline and 14,000 sqm manufacturing plant and made two successful acquisitions and other strategic initiatives.
From 2003-2013, he (co-)founded seven different biotech companies including Celonic (contract manufacturing organization), Baliopharm (innovator company for autoimmune diseases, oncology), Synimmune (bispecific antibodies, oncology), ICAAN (Aesthetic Navigation), Icelandic Natura (Topica), and Probiocon (Consulting). In 1996, Dr. Herrmann co-founded Cardion AG where he was heading the R&D department until 2003. He received his PhD in biochemistry in the field of neurobiology at the University of Cologne and worked as an associate professor in the department of cardiovascular physiology at the University of Düsseldorf.
Norbert Bleich
CMO, COO
Norbert comes with Diploma degree in chemistry gained at the university of Freiburg and 25 years of experience at Quintiles (1993), Novartis (1998), Hoffmann-La Roche (2008), and Boehringer Ingelheim (2017).
He had leading positions in Pharma Development and Corporate functions, which included heading functions like Global Services implementing R&D hubs in Japan, China, and India, medical writing including document and submission management with responsibility for more than 200 Development projects and 10 NME submissions during this period, and portfolio governance for both the Clinical portfolio as well as Innovation and Efficiency in Development, and Portfolio Management of the Merial Animal Health integration into Boehringer Ingelheim.
As a successful entrepreneur, Norbert recently (co)-founded Versameb AG, a regenerative medicine start-up, kicking off the company as CEO.
Thomas Fleig
CFO
Thomas Fleig has gained more than eleven years of experience in the finance industry and as an entrepreneur.
Following his M.Sc. degree at the University of Exeter, Mr. Fleig was responsible to introduce a London based wealth management firm in the DACH region.
Since 2008, Mr. Fleig worked as a manager in Transaction Advisory Services at Ernst&Young and as a contractor for Private Equity and Corporate clients in various sectors. In addition, he set-up an interior design trading company and was appointed as a Director of various holding companies for a leading US private equity investor.
Stefanie Herrmann-Zahn
VP Project Management
Stefanie Herrmann-Zahn has about 20 years of experience in the development of biopharmaceutical compounds.
Mrs. Herrmann-Zahn gained her diploma as a chemical engineer at Krefeld in 1997. She then joined AGS, where she worked as scientist in the fields of fermentation and enzyme purification. In 1998, she joined Cardion, where she led the biopharmaceutical development department including cell culture, process development, manufacturing and quality control.
In 2003, Mrs. Herrmann-Zahn worked at Celonic GmbH as Head of Process Development in Jülich before she became Head of Production at the GMP Facility of Celonic AG in Basel. Furthermore, she was appointed as VP Project Management.
From 2014–2016, Mrs. Herrmann-Zahn was VP Project Management at Alvotech, where she was leading cross-functional teams for the development of four biosimilar products.