Synomics Appoints New Senior Executive to Lead Business Development Drive

Synomics, the biological insights business, and part of the Wheatsheaf Group, has appointed Paul Doran, a veteran in the world of plant and animal genetics, to the role of Senior Vice President, Business Development.

Paul started his career conducting molecular biology research at the USDA’s Cereal Rust Laboratory and Pulmonary Medicine at the University of Minnesota, prior to moving into the biotech industry in 1994. He has since spent more than a quarter of a century in sales and business development at leading biotechnology companies including Cellular Dynamics, Agena Bioscience, Affymetrix, and Life Technologies.

In 2003, Paul worked with Mayo Clinic and the University of Texas Health Science Center (UTHSC) in Houston to secure National Institute of Health (NIH) funding for the first SNP-based Genome-wide Association Study (GWAS).

Most recently he was General Manager at the start-up iGenomX where he rolled out high throughput sequencing technology for Agrigenomics, population genetics and synthetic biology markets. The company was acquired in June 2021. Prior to that he was Director of Sales and BD at NRGene, a big data company that was first to assemble the wheat genome and to commercialise pangenome databases.

Paul says that the common theme across all these businesses was that they were at the forefront of dramatically increasing the world’s understanding of genomics: “That’s what so appeals to me about Synomics,” he explains. “The combinatorial computation pipeline that Synomics developed, brings novel insights and a clearer picture to traits and disease.

“While we have known that many variants collectively contribute to a phenotype, it was only practical to analyse single variants at a time, until now. I am excited to help bring this powerful capability to market and partner Synomics with groups wanting to extract the most value from their data sets.”

The biological insights Synomics delivers are achieved by using its proprietary combinatorial Insights Platform that has been adapted from a technology already proven to find new treatment opportunities for unmet medical needs across a range of diseases in humans. The platform enables animal and crop scientists and producers to gain a better understanding of what drives key production traits and innovate accordingly.

Paul, who is based in Minnesota USA, will report to Peter Kristensen, Synomics Chief Executive Officer.