Dr Rupert Vessey—Former President of Early Development and Research of Bristol MyersSquibb, now Chief Scientific Officer & Executive Partner at Flagship Pioneering—shares his journey from following the family tradition into medicine with Sir John Bell at Oxford University as his advisor while juggling a love and talent for rugby to then honing in on a […]

Dr David Pyott—portfolio board member, philanthropist, and former CEO & Chairman of Allergan—was destined for an international life which led to him live in 10 countries and work in 7. He shares his journey, from growing up in India and becoming fluent in Marathi, to attending Edinburgh University and London Business School, to becoming CEO

Dr Clive Meanwell—founder & CEO of Population Health Partners; founder & former CEO of The Medicines Company—shares his journey emanating from a family of teachers in Birmingham to earning his medical degree at University of Birmingham and playing first class rugby to a corporate career that led to him founding and leading The Medicines Company

Nigel Gaymond, BELS Founder & Executive Chairman, provides a brief overview of BELS (British Educated Life Scientists) & the BELS Brief Chats podcast.

We’re delighted to welcome Dr Rupert Vessey to the BELS Advisory Council. Based in the US as EVP and President of Research & Early Discovery for Bristol Myers Squibb, his work includes several initiatives in the UK. His perspectives on the sector in the UK and globally will be invaluable as we expand the work

Thankfully, COVID lockdown restrictions are now easing. The number of daily COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in the UK recently hit record highs. Over half of the adult population has now received at least one dose of a vaccine, and 2,228,772 people have been fully vaccinated. While the UK health and life sciences sector has made

British-educated life scientists at home and abroad share a heritage of great achievement which continues demonstrably and collaboratively amid the COVID pandemic. Since founding BELS 20 years ago, we’ve operated under the premise that only good things can come from strengthening connections between British-educated life scientists and the UK health and life sciences. With this

The success of the UK’s response to covid-19 has come with industry and academia collaborating at speed, along with government support for a nimble, empowered UK Vaccine Taskforce, well equipped to evaluate potential vaccine candidates and free to secure contracts outside of Brexit–negotiating volume, pricing and delivery. This allowed the UK to go it alone

The most visible work now being done in Oxford is on the vaccine front where the University, its spinout Vaccitech, and its partnership with AstraZeneca are garnering global headlines for making warp-speed progress on their vaccine. This has been topped off with news of BARDA providing AstraZeneca with up to $1.2 billion to fund Phase

Much like the Bletchley Park codebreakers helped win World War II by breaking the German Enigma Code, a swiftly-recruited, specialist-volunteer team from Barts Health, Queen Mary University of London and Genomics England is assembling at Charterhouse Square in Central London to decipher the highly-complex, virulent-virus COVID-19. Led by Professor Sir Mark Caulfield, Chief Scientist at

With a new decade upon us, we finally have some clarity and go-forward in the UK’s political system. Meanwhile, the UK life sciences environment has continued to go from strength to strength despite three years of Brexit purgatory. Clear signals are emanating from Number 10 that science and life sciences are viewed as vital to the

When I moved to the US over 30 years ago I was chasing a woman, though I assume most of my British-educated colleagues working outside the UK in the life sciences left to take up new jobs. Regardless, none of us kicked up quite the public storm that’s coming from Harry and Meghan’s decision to step

For the UK to fulfill its international aspirations in the life sciences, tapping into the soft power of its influential diaspora, including the 3,000+ life science leaders within the British Expats in Life Sciences (BELS) global community, should be a high priority for UK organisations across our sector—government, quasi-government orgs, industry, academia, charities, healthcare orgs, service providers,

As we head into one of the biggest bun fights of the year at the BIO convention in Philadelphia, hopes are high for new learning and links, seeing and being seen, and warming up or booking business. Attendance at BIO, BIO Europe, Medica, ASCO and the like is important to annual marketing efforts. But there’s a

BELS Brexit Perspective, March 22, 2019 As we lurch onward in this Brexit purgatory, there is no end in sight to chaos, delays and uncertainty.  And our hard-earned international reputation for pragmatism and a functioning democracy is being mightily tested with our politicians seemingly paralyzed. The UK has been successful for a long time largely