Laurent Jespers, PhD
Chief Scientific Officer

Laurent brings over 25 years of scientific leadership and managerial experience in biotech and pharma sector, with a focus on developing innovative biopharmaceutical modalities through to preclinical development. Before joining Xap in 2021, Laurent was VP of Discovery, Cell & Gene Therapy at GSK, overseeing preclinical to IND programs based on autologous T cell therapies for cancer and gene therapy programs for auto-immune and respiratory programs. Laurent previously served as VP of Biopharm Innovation and Site Head of GSK Cambridge Satellite, driving novel drug modalities from concept to preclinical development for oncology and metabolic diseases.

Prior to that, Laurent served as Director of Platform Technology, at Domantis, a company developing biopharmaceuticals based on human domain antibodies.

Laurent received his master’s degree in chemistry and a PhD in Biochemistry from the University of Leuven, Belgium. He completed his post-doctoral training under the supervision of Dr Greg Winter (Chemistry Nobel Prize, 2018) at the MRC-Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge, and Prof Desire Collen at Centre for Molecular and Vascular Biology, Leuven.