On 4 November, Knut Steffensen will be taking up office as the director of the Karolinska ATMP Centre, a leading centre for advanced therapy medicinal products, with research, manufacture and treatment all under one roof.
The Karolinska ATMP Center is a joint venture between Karolinska Institutet and Karolinska University Hospital tasked with consolidating all ATMP operations based on cells, genes or tissues to enhance the development and implementation of cell, gene and tissue therapies.
“I’m very much looking forward to working with the units at KI and the hospital that are at the forefront of the ATMP field,” says Knut Steffensen. “With my experience of the pharmaceutical industry and KI, I hope that we’ll continue to create conditions for the research and development of advance therapy medicines. Ultimately, the motivation is that subsequent implementation by doctors will bring great patient benefit.”
An academic fellow with experience from industry
Knut Steffensen holds a PhD in molecular medicine and was previously the Nordic Medical Lead in Cell Therapy at Kite-Gilead. He has many years’ experience of the pharmaceutical industry and has been a docent at Karolinska Institutet.
“We already have world-leading competence at Karolinska Institutet and the university hospital researching, developing or administering cell, gene and tissue therapies,” says Mathias Axelsson, head of Medical Diagnostics at Karolinska University Hospital. “However, developments are moving fast and to really provide patient benefit we need to quickly step up our collaboration even more, and Knut Steffensen’s industry experience will clearly make a valuable contribution to the Karolinska ATMP Centre.”
Karolinska ATMP Center
The foundations for the centre were laid back in 1975 with the Medical Unit for Cell Therapy and Allogeneic Stem Cell Transplantation. The centre now has high ambitions to forge stronger, closer ties with public sector actors and pharmaceutical companies.
“Knut Steffensen has exactly the right background and experience to lead the Karolinska ATMP Centre,” says Matti Sällberg, Dean of Karolinska Institutet South and the centre’s acting director. “He has solid experience of basic research at molecular level and practical knowledge of the very latest ATMP drugs from the industry. This gives him a unique overall picture of what’s required for taking discoveries in basic research all the way to new cell and gene therapy-based drugs. I extend a warm welcome to Knut to these new and exciting challenges at the Karolinska ATMP Centre.”
This article was first published on 19 October by Karolinska Institutet.
Receive the Funding Newswire each Tuesday, our Policy Bulletin each Thursday, and news about bridging Europe’s east-west innovation gap twice a month in The Widening. 
A unique international forum for public research organisations and companies to connect their external engagement with strategic interests around their R&D system.
