Philip Jones, PhD

Philip Jones is a seasoned drug hunter with around 25-years of drug discovery and development experience. He has spent his career to date, both in industry with Merck and more recently in academia with MD Anderson, leading drug discovery programs and advancing high quality therapeutics into clinical testing.

During his tenure with Merck at three locations worldwide, he led several of Merck’s oncology drug discovery programs, overseeing cross-functional project teams that successfully delivered novel candidates into ongoing clinical trials. These include the PARP inhibitor niraparib (ZejulaTM) which is approved for the treatment of ovarian and prostate cancer. He was also involved in the successful development of Raltegravir, the first-in-class HIV integrase inhibitor.

At MD Anderson, he established the Institute for Applied Cancer Sciences (IACS) and Therapeutics Discovery Division, a biotech-like drug discovery group which in collaboration with academic collaborators developed a large portfolio of projects, many of which advanced into early-stage clinical trials. Several of these programs were either licensed to biopharma companies for further development or spun out into new companies.

Dr. Jones received his PhD in organic chemistry from the University of Nottingham, UK, and completed his post-doctoral research at Philipps-Universität Marburg, Germany.