Kenneth Wertman

Following the completion of his Ph.D. in Molecular and Cellular Biology from the University of Arizona, Dr. Wertman took postdoctoral research training in Molecular Genetics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Subsequently, he was employed at Genentech in South San Francisco, prior to accepting a position in the Molecular and Cellular Biology Department at University of California at Berkeley. In 1992 he joined the Selectide Corporation, a startup biotech company in the emerging combinatorial chemistry field. Through a series of mergers and acquisitions, which included Hoechst Marion Roussel and Aventis, Selectide ultimately landed within the Sanofi, US organization. Over these years the center delivered numerous lead drug compounds to company programs, and emerged as a driver of innovation across the key lead generation disciplines, including, automated chemistry, high throughput biology, computational chemistry, early safety assessment and information technologies. It is the innovation offered in the interplay of these disciplines which most interests him.