Episode Details

General Atlantic Managing Director and Global Head of Life Sciences sits down with Bahija Jallal, CEO of Immunocore, a leading biotechnology company aiming to develop a new generation of transformative medicines. They discuss the personal experiences that led Bahija to devote her career to science; the enduring source of inspiration that her mother provides; the power of research and its ability to change lives; the critical importance of diversity in STEM and how Bahjia’s role has allowed her to pave a path for other women in the industry; her view that innovation is rooted in diversity of thought and why diverse leadership is an essential ingredient of commercial successful; the challenges associated with ‘pipeline leakage,’ revealing how diverse talent can get lost in an organization; Immunocore’s groundbreaking development of a novel class of T-cell receptor immunotherapies and the company’s milestone FDA approval of Kimmitrak, the first and only FDA-approved therapy to treat an aggressive form of eye cancer; the difficult yet necessary decisions Bahija had to make when she began her role as CEO just before the pandemic hit; Immunocore’s TCR technology and how it is being explored as an approach to other chronic viral infections; the U.S. government’s active role in funding research; how the pursuit of treatments to chronic viral infections is attractive to scientists throughout the world, including those who come to the U.S. to work on potentially transformative projects; the ways in which COVID-19 posed unique challenges to leadership; and other topics.