Medison Establishes Canada’s Only Innovative Pharma Commercial Company

June 25, 2019 Off By BusinessWire

Joe O’Neill Announced as General Manager of Medison Canada

PETACH TIKVA, Israel–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Medison Biotech (1995) Ltd. (“Medison”), today announced the appointment of Mr. Joe O’Neill as General Manager of Medison Canada. Headquartered in Toronto, Canada, Medison Canada is the only specialized pharmaceutical and biotech company in Canada purely focused on licensing highly innovative, cutting edge therapeutics for patients in need of life saving therapies. Medison (and its affiliates) are also the second largest shareholders of Knight therapeutics (TSX:GUD).

Medison is one of the world’s largest commercial partners of leading global biotech companies and Canada is the newest addition to the International offering for partners and their products, which now includes Israel, Central East Europe and Canada, covering a total of over 90 million people. Medison’s mission is to provide patients with access to life saving and life altering therapeutics as early as possible post FDA or EMA approval.

In launching its operations in Toronto, Medison is initiating a significant commitment to Canadian patients and its thriving biotech community. Medison is also extremely pleased to have the experience and leadership of Joe O’Neill as General Manager. Mr. O’Neill has more than 15 years of experience in leadership roles in the biotech industry.

Meir Jakobsohn, CEO of Medison said, “Canada is an important market for the development and evolution of the biotech industry, but also because of the absence of any focused effort by specialty pharma to bring proven, innovative, commercial therapeutics available elsewhere to patients in Canada that are in need. Indeed, we have already started discussions with several leading biotech companies for commercialization of their products in Canada. We are very pleased to bring our substantial experience and unique scientific capabilities directly to the Canadian market.”

Added Jakobsohn, “We are also very pleased to appoint Joe O’Neill as General Manager of Medison Canada. Joe is a seasoned biotech executive and has a deep understanding of our approach to engage with companies with pre-approved products for future commercialization or investment opportunities through an active venture arm. Through his leadership, we believe that Medison Canada can very quickly scale its platform of products and investments in Canada.”

Joe O’Neill said, “I am excited to work with the Medison team and I share Medison’s vision to provide the complete spectrum of integrated services for companies looking to enter or expand their presence in select International markets. For too long, Canada has lacked a focused player in this critical channel and we intend to open it significantly, for the benefit of Canadian patients who lack access to medicines typically available already in the USA or Europe. I am confident that Medison Canada will quickly become the premier choice for those companies seeking a dedicated, highly knowledgeable Canadian commercial biotech partner utilizing Medison’s existing foundation, long track-record of success and unique qualifications.

Added O’Neill, “In addition, Medison Canada will benefit from the vivid Canadian innovation scene and actively pursue investment and business development opportunities within the sector, scouting out innovation and bringing those opportunities to a platform that can take an emerging Canadian company with novel products in its pipeline and give them the resources and expertise to succeed on a much larger scale, in a much faster way.”

About Joe O’Neill

Joe O’Neill joins Medison Canada following his role as General Manager of Accelera Pharma, a company focused on providing innovative pharmaceutical and biotech products to the Canadian Healthcare Community. Prior to Accelera, Joe was Chief Commercial Officer for ADIENNE, where he oversaw the commercial and business functions in North and South America during a period of significant growth in revenue for the company. Under his leadership, ADIENNE gained FDA and Health Canada approvals of their lead drug TEPADINA. Prior to ADIENNE, Joe held senior commercial positions at Genzyme (now a division of Sanofi), most recently as Senior Director Marketing of the U.S. hematology and oncology business units. Earlier in his career, Joe held a number of commercial roles in the Canadian Pharmaceutical industry at Johnson & Johnson, Berlex (now Bayer) and Abbott. He holds a B.Sc. from Queen’s University.

About Medison

Medison is one of the world’s largest commercial partners of leading global biotech companies. Medison is uniquely qualified to provide the complete spectrum of integrated services for international companies looking to enter or expand their presence in Israel Canada and Central & Eastern Europe. Medison runs a corporate venture arm with a dedicated research and evaluation team boasting deep scientific and commercial backgrounds. Medison also operates a scouting program to cater its partners and is an active investor in life science projects around drug development and digital health.