Belgian biopharmaceutical company Ablynx has appointed Johan Heylen as Chief Commercial Officer.
Heylen has more than 20 years of experience in global biopharmaceutical sales, marketing and business development at GSK, Servier and Wyeth.
Most recently, Heylen was Executive Director, Global Commercial Lead, Cancer Immunotherapeutics, at GSK, where he headed the global commercial teams and was responsible for the development and implementation of the launch strategy for GSK's cancer immunotherapeutics portfolio.
Prior to that, he led and launched the global commercial and marketing efforts for three of GSK's paediatric vaccines, Rotarix, Priorix and Varilix, which together achieved sales of more than €1.5bn. He has experience in a wide range of therapeutic fields.
Welcoming Heylen to the team, Edwin Moses, CEO of Ablynx, said: ‘His extensive commercial experience with some of the world's leading companies will help Ablynx to maximise the potential of our pipeline as our programmes move through the clinic and towards the market. He will also bring valuable expertise to our business development team as we seek to develop our relationships with pharmaceutical companies around the world.’
