About us

IOCB Tech is the leading Czech technology transfer office and is a subsidiary company of IOCB (the Institute of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry CAS) – a member of the Czech Academy of Sciences. We help to transform the inventions and scientific outcomes coming from research performed at IOCB by scientists in medicinal chemistry, material sciences, biology, and other chemistry-related fields. The main goal is to make these inventions available to ultimately benefit society.

The IOCB Tech team supports management and decision-making processes in multiple projects targeted at novel drugs and scientific tools. As IOCB Tech, we provide services to the scientists at IOCB in the areas of due diligence analyses, market potential studies, and project feasibility.

One integral part of our work is the protection of intellectual property and know-how, and therefore our team has an in-house Czech and European patent attorney.

IOCB Tech additionally engages in business development activities – identifying collaboration, licensing, and co-development partners, negotiating contracts and agreements. We foster a bridge between academia and industry.

We are also tasked with finding networking and industry partners for IOCB, and in this we are among the most successful businesses of our kind in the Czech Republic.

Our International Business Advisory Board advises us in our strategic decision making. The IBA’s members combine deep knowledge in IP issues and international and local business, and they have an inside knowledge of unmet medical needs, as well as Big Pharma experience.

What do we do?

Our main goal is to connect science and business to make the results of scientific research available to society. At IOCB Tech, help to bring projects from their beginnings to a successful start in practice. We actively seek out the best results of scientific and research activities and assess their market potential. In addition to consulting, we provide project management, legal work, and IP protection, as well as contractual work and presentations.

At IOCB we transform research results into successful products

Project analysis and management

Our office provides services connected to a project’s process beginning from the moment of its disclosure. These include the market analysis, the freedom-to-operate analysis, and the analysis of patentability. Once the project is found to be commercially viable, we participate in the design of the project development plan, help to secure the financing, and then take on responsibility for the management of process evolution. An important part of this work is also a constantly growing network of CROs that can provide project development services.

Legal and IPR work

A project’s legal and intellectual property work begins from the moment of the technology disclosure and evolves alongside the project over many years. If the project leads to a patent application, we take responsibility for the intellectual property’s future life cycle and are also fully involved in the legal work connected to licensing and other steps. Very often an invention will be the result of inter-institutional collaboration, in which case we also take care of all agreements related to this.

Business development

Once a project reaches maturity, we present it at different international conferences including BIO Europe, BIO International (US), Bio Japan, BioVaria, and others. We also have a network of company contacts which we include in the process of business development.

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Our team

Martin Fusek

CEO

Martin has studied Organic Chemistry and finished his Ph.D. in Biochemistry in 1988. After spending 6 years as a postdoctoral fellow in laboratories in the USA and Germany he started to work in the industry sector, specifically for Sigma-Aldrich and Merck. Since 2007 he focused on the development of the technology transfer office at the IOCB in Prague and is the CEO of IOCB Tech since 2009.

martin.fusek@uochb.cas.cz

Julie Proft

Head of Project Management

Julie, a Biochemistry graduate from the University of Greifswald, Germany, embarked on a remarkable academic journey. She earned her Ph.D. at the Friedrich Loeffler Institute (FLI) Riems, specialising in Mad Cow Disease. After gaining valuable experience as a postdoctoral fellow at the Hotchkiss Brain Institute (HBI) in Calgary, Canada, Julie returned to Europe for another postdoc at IOCB in Prague. Since January 2016, she has been an integral part of the IOCB Tech team, contributing her expertise to cutting-edge research and technological advancements.

juliane.proft@uochb.cas.cz

Jana Kenney

Project Manager

Jana holds a Ph.D. in Neuroscience, which she obtained from Ruhr University Bochum, Germany. She followed with a post-doc in a CNRS-affiliated laboratory in Lyon, France. Finally, she gained experience in pharmaceutical industry (regulatory affairs) as a scientific consultant and medical writer, before joining the IOCB Tech team in September 2017.

jana.kenney@uochb.cas.cz

Jan Šotola

Project Manager

Jan graduated in Physical Chemistry from the University of Chemical Technology in Prague and he did his Ph.D. studies at The Heyrovsky Institute of Physical Chemistry and Electrochemistry of the Academy of Sciences in Prague. He stayed as a postdoc at the Fritz-Haber Institute (Max Planck Society) in Berlin, Germany. Jan has a long industrial experience. He worked as a TQM manager, API Business director, and finally R&D director at Zentiva. After a short period of consulting activity, he spent 2 years developing oral insulin tablets. Jan has joint the IOCB Tech team in 2014.

jan.sotola@uochb.cas.cz

Sofiia Svirska

Project Manager

In 2007, Sofiia graduated with a degree in Pharmacy from the Ivano-Frankivsk National Medical University, Ukraine. In 2019, she received her PhD in Pharmacy. She gained experience as a researcher and university teacher at the Ivano-Frankivsk National Medical University. Sofiia joined the IOCB Tech team in 2022.

sofiia.svirska@uochb.cas.cz

Ladislava Součková

Czech and European Patent Attorney

Ladislava, a Biochemistry graduate from Charles University in Prague, has a diverse background in research and intellectual property protection. With 9 years of experience as a research assistant at the Institute of Pharmacology, she concurrently pursued and successfully obtained her Ph.D. degree from Charles University in 1993. Ladislava furthered her expertise with a one-year fellowship at the Institute of Chemistry of Natural Compounds in Gif-sur-Yvette, France. She then expanded her education to become a patent attorney, passing the exam in 1997. Since then, Ladislava has been dedicated to the field of IP protection in chemistry, working in specialized patent offices, commercial companies, and academic institutes.

ladislava.souckova@uochb.cas.cz

Kateřina Habelová

IP Associate

After graduating with a degree in biochemistry from Charles University in 2003, Katerina worked in the clinical laboratory AeskuLab. In 2005, she sought a new opportunity with Sigma-Aldrich as a Life Science Specialist in the sales department and joined the IOCB Tech team in 2012. From 2019 to 2021 Kateřina studied at the Industrial Property Training Institute of the Industrial Property Office of the Czech Republic.

katerina.habelova@uochb.cas.cz

Barbara Eignerová

Lawyer

Barbara graduated with an MSc degree in Organic Chemistry from Charles University in Prague and obtained her Ph.D. from IOCB in Prague. During her Ph.D. studies, Barbara proceeded with her education at the Industrial Property Office and decided to pursue a new career in law. After graduating with the MSc in Law from Charles University in Prague, she worked as a lawyer at the State Institute for Drug Control. She joined the IOCB Tech team in 2019.

barbara.eignerova@uochb.cas.cz

Jana Schimmerová

Projects Administrative

After graduating with a degree in Economics from the University of Economics in Prague, Jana served as the Head of the support team in the sales department at eBANKA, the first internet bank. She gained valuable expertise while working in various companies. In 2015, she had the opportunity to work for the Research Board at the Technology Agency of the Czech Republic. In May 2023, Jana joined the IOCB Tech team.

jana.schimmerova@iocbtech.cz

Martin Opatrný

PR Manager

Is an expert in Public Relations and Public Affairs. He has over twenty years of experience in media and PR, both from the private sector, state administration or international corporate business. His domain is a strategic and crisis communication. Martin is also a sought after lecturer in many aspects of communication. He completed his Ph.D. studies at the Faculty of Arts of Charles University in Prague with specialization in communication and psychology.

opatrny@prclinic.eu

Jan Skácel

Pharmtheon Project Manager

Jan started his medicinal chemistry trajectory in high school, studying chemical and pharmaceutical technology from 2005. He received his undergraduate degree in medicinal chemistry from The University of Chemistry and Technology, Prague, and continued to earn his Ph.D. in the same field at the Institute of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry of the Czech Academy of Sciences. Following his doctoral studies, Jan spent his postdoctoral period at the Johns Hopkins Drug Discovery Center in Baltimore. He then returned to Czechia and started a collaboration with IOCB Tech, ultimately joining the team officially in 2023.

jan.skacel@uochb.cas.cz

Barbara Hrdličková

Pharmtheon Project Manager

Barbara holds a Ph.D. in Human Genetics from the Groningen University Institute for Drug Exploration in the Netherlands with hands-on experience in different-sized biotech companies and clinical trials site. As a Marie Curie fellow, Barbara pursued her postdoc in functional studies focusing on inflammatory bowel disease at the University of Michigan, USA. With her solid scientific background, she joined a biotech Enantis, the first spin-off from Masaryk University, where she established the biological division and deepened the biological R&D. Afterwards, she contributed significantly to the preclinical development of cancer immunotherapies using the antibody-drug conjugation (ADC) platform (SOTIO Biotech).  Barbara joined the IOCB Tech team in January 2023.

barbara.hrdlickova@iocbtech.cz

William Lee

Dr. William “Bill” Lee served as the Executive Vice President of Research at Gilead Sciences. He received his BS in Chemistry from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from the University of California San Diego. He did postdoctoral work at the EPFL in Switzerland and at the University of California Santa Barbara. He began his industry career at Syntex Research in Palo Alto in the Preformulation Department and then moved to California Biotechnology where he was head of Drug Delivery. He came to Gilead Sciences as Director of Pharmaceutical Development in 1991.  Dr. Lee is a co-inventor of Cellcept®, Viread® and tenofovir alafenamide, a lymphatic targeting prodrug of tenofovir which was recently approved for the treatment of HIV in the combination product, Genvoya®.

James Lorens

Professor James Lorens, Ph.D. is an academic entrepreneur with over 35 years research and industry experience from the US and Europe. Head of Oncology and a founding scientist at Rigel Pharmaceuticals Inc (RIGL). Founder and CSO of BerGenBio ASA (BGBIO). Developed the first AXL targeting agent (bemcentinib) into the clinic. Member of the Norwegian National Academy of Sciences and Letters, Principal Investigator in the Norwegian Centre of Excellence in Cancer Biomarkers and Professor in the University of Bergen Medical Faculty.

Jiří Michal

Jiri Michal is a highly experienced professional in the pharmaceutical industry. He has been with Zentiva for 36 years and served as its CEO from 1993-2010.

Vít Perlík

Director of Regulatory and Clinical Development at Pharminvent

Vit is currently acting as a Director of Regulatory Science and Clinical Development in Pharminvent.

He is profoundly skilled in the area of Clinical Development strategies/study design/data mining, which he gained in multinational pharmaceutical companies e.g. Sanofi, Zentiva Inhalationprodukte and Zentiva. His background includes over 15 years of research experience covering areas of clinical pharmacology and phase I as well as phase II and III studies particularly in inhalation drug development, generic development and pain and obesity management.

Educated at the 3rd faculty of medicine in Charles University and resident at the Bulovka hospital department of infectious disease, Vit also served a three years tenure as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Health Science Center, the University of Tennessee in the US.

As a professional, Vit had facilitated the design, strategic development and data mining of bioequivalence, pharmacodynamics and clinical studies. As a member of the PharmInvent team, he is responsible for driving the processes for clinical development strategy including but not limited to scientific support, protocol development, scientific evaluation, and data interpretation.

Ursula Vogel

Ursula Vogel, a biopharmaceutical industry veteran, started her career at Merck & Co (MSD) in West Point, PA, USA, where her research led to significant discoveries in the field of oncology. After another R&D position at Rhone-Poulenc (Sanofi), she was recruited to launch the European operation of the pioneering US biotech Genetics Institute (Pfizer) where she was responsible for managing key product development and business development activities for several programs, including InductOs(R), BeneFIX(R)and DiscoverEaseTM. She then joined ZS Associates where she co-managed the newly established European headquarters.

In 1999 she started her own independent consulting practice, specializing in providing C-level business development support to companies in all stages of the deal-making process. In this capacity, she has led in /out licensing and other partnering efforts for large pharmaceutical companies, publicly traded biotech companies, and VC backed companies (USA, Europe, and China), resulting in an extensive list of transactions. She has also served as an Advisor to top tier venture capital and private equity firms, not-for-profit entities, foundations, and universities and has a broad experience across various therapeutic areas and modalities.

Ursula holds a Ph.D. in Biochemistry from Cambridge University, a B.Sc. from Imperial College and an MBA from INSEAD.

Martin Opatrný

PR Manager

Is an expert in Public Relations and Public Affairs. He has over twenty years of experience in media and PR, both from the private sector, state administration or international corporate business. His domain is a strategic and crisis communication. Martin is also a sought after lecturer in many aspects of communication. He completed his Ph.D. studies at the Faculty of Arts of Charles University in Prague with specialization in communication and psychology.

opatrny@prclinic.eu