Dr. Niyikiza is founder and Executive Chairman of Leaf4Life, whose mission is to discover, develop, manufacture and commercialize innovative and safe medicines, in particular, medicines that target high unmet medical needs arising from the complications of hypoxia (oxygen deprivation).
Dr. Niyikiza has 31 years of experience in pharmaceutical research and development, including clinical experience as a Lilly Research Fellow at Eli Lilly & Company; Global Vice President of Medicine Development Strategy at GlaxoSmithKline; and Executive Vice President of Development at Merrimack Pharmaceuticals.
During his career he has been involved in the development registration of 15 new drug indications including the popular anticancer drugs ALIMTA®, GEMZAR® and EVISTA®. He is the inventor of over 30 patents in the pharmaceutical industry, highlighted by his status as the sole inventor of the vitamin supplementation patent for ALIMTA®.