Vice President, Strategic Projects, Global External Innovation & Alliances, Bayer AG John leads Bayer global external innovation partnerships, including development of alliances with well-established international scientists and research organizations, as well as young and promising scientific start-ups. John joined Bayer January 1988 as a Laboratory Head in Medicinal Chemistry. Between 1992 and 1999 he was a Project Manager in Drug Development. 1999 he was named Corporate Vice-president in charge of the Central Coordination of R&D. He spend 6 years in Strategic Planning both at Corporate and Pharmaceutical Division levels, during that period he lead strategy projects in areas such as Therapeutic Proteins, Hematology Research, Innovation in Glucose Monitoring, Toxicology Operations, for several divisions of Bayer AG. In 2007 he joined Bayer Innovations as Global Project Leader Plant-made-Pharmaceuticals. In this function he was responsible for the development of a technology platform to express therapeutic proteins in planta, in particular, he lead the development of Bayer’s autologous therapeutic cancer vaccine against Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. This included the oversight of investment in a manufacturing plant, introduction of GMPs, certification by local authorities and finally, conducting a proof-of-concept study in patients. Since 2014, John has been with the Global External Innovations Group, in charge of Venture Capital Investment and European Projects with impact in clinical development. A native of the Dominican Republic, John studied Chemistry at Heidelberg University. He worked as a research fellow at the Max-Planck-Institute for Medical Research (Heidelberg) and obtained a Dr.rer.nat. in 1986. He spent two years as Research Associate at Rockefeller University (Tom Kaiser’s Lab) conducting work in molecular biology and enzymology of phosphatases. John is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Institute for Infection and Immunity at St George's, University of London. He is a former member of the German Research Council Evaluation Committee of Chemistry Faculties.