Mission & vision

Having an innovative pipeline of pharmaceutical drug candidates that have been developed through internal R&D or research projects with key regional partners, Axonova is leading the way in nature-inspired drug discovery.

The company is the first private organization to set up a high content screening platform for pharmaceutical and nutraceutical testing. Axonova aims to become the reference laboratory for exploratory research and bio-analytical testing in the Sub-Saharan region.

Our missions are to:

(i) Implement innovative laboratory infrastructures and platforms to support the growing demand of the regional biotechnology and biomedical industries.

(ii) Explore and valorise the regional biodiversity, which represents a very unique ecosystem offering access to thousands of plants and marine species that exist nowhere else on the planet.

Fabien is a biotech entrepreneur who cumulates more than 12 years of experience in the Life Sciences industry. Before coming back to Mauritius in 2017 to start his entrepreneurial journey at Axonova, he has been working for 8 years in leading research institutions in Europe (INSERM, Maastricht University, Servier Laboratories, Brightlands).

During his career in Europe, Fabien has held several positions in research and business development, thereby gaining experience in drug discovery, preclinical development, licensing of intellectual property and start-up development. Fabien is co-author of 12 peer-reviewed articles in international scientific journals in the field of neuropsychiatry and drug discovery. He founded Axonova in 2017 and is the current CEO of the company.

Fabien holds a joint European PhD degree in Neuropharmacology from Paris-Descartes University (France) and Maastricht University (The Netherlands) as well as an MBA degree in Management of Biotechnology from Ionis School of Technology and Management in Paris (France).

Shameem has over 13 years of experience in the field of scientific research and innovation. She returned to Mauritius after 12 years spent in the UK where she completed her tertiary studies with a PhD degree in Stem Cell and Cancer Biology from University of Westminster (London, UK) after which she embarked on her scientific career path at the renowned Manchester Cancer Research Institute (Cancer Research UK Organisation, UK) from which she obtained her Postdoctoral qualification in Cancer Cell Signalling.

Shameem held several positions in Research & Development during which she has mastered and lectured on techniques in the fields of stem cell and cancer biology, novel therapeutic targets characterisation and bioinformatics data mining. She has co-authored several high-impact factor peer-reviewed publications and is on the reviewer panel of scientific journals.

During her career, Shameem has been the recipient of numerous prestigious awards including the Best Young Mauritian Scientist Award (Ministry of Technology, Communication and Innovation) and Best Mauritian Women Scientist Award (UNESCO-MERCK Foundation) in recognition of her work and contribution to science.

WHY WORK WITH US

At Axonova, we are committed to supporting our partners by providing
the most advanced and robust services as well as by
generating reproducible and reliable results.