Riccardo Cortese - Brief biography#

Riccardo Cortese, is the chief Executive Officer and one of the co-founder of Okairos.

Previously, Riccardo established the Gene Expression Unit at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, and was the founder and head of the Istituto di Ricerche di Biologia Molecolare (IRBM) in Rome, Italy, which later became a subsidiary of Merck Inc.

Riccardo has been instrumental in the development of several novel antiviral drugs and vaccines, which range from various stages of clinical development to fully marketed, including Isentress for HIV.

He has also published in leading scientific journals including Nature, Science and Cell, on immunology, molecular medicine and drug discovery.

Riccardo is a Professor of Molecular Biology at the medical school of the University of Naples, Italy, where he completed his medical degree before receiving his PhD from the University of California at Berkeley.

He is an elected member of several international associations, including the Académie Française, the Academia Europaea and European Molecular Biology Organisation (EMBO). He is a member of the Board of Directors of MolMed S.p.A.