Latif Nasser
Co-Host & Director of Research, Radiolab (WNYC Studios) | Host & Executive Producer, Netflix's Connected | Harvard PhD | Science Storyteller & TED Speaker
Gregory Winter
2018 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry | Inventor of Humanized & Human Therapeutic Antibodies | Co-Founder, Bicycle Therapeutics | Fellow of the Royal Society | Copley Medal 2024
Sir Gregory Winter is the scientist whose inventions underpin virtually every major antibody drug on the market — from Herceptin and Avastin to Humira, the world's best-selling medicine. His 2018 Nobel Prize in Chemistry recognized a body of work that has saved millions of lives and generated hundreds of billions in pharmaceutical value. He is also a serial biotech founder whose companies have been acquired by AstraZeneca and GSK.
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Gregory Winter biography
Sir Gregory Winter is one of the most consequential scientists in the history of modern medicine — a British molecular biologist whose inventions in antibody engineering underpin virtually every major therapeutic antibody on the market today. He is a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, a Fellow of the Royal Society, and the recipient of the 2024 Copley Medal — the Royal Society’s most prestigious award, first granted in 1731 — in recognition of a career that has irreversibly changed how humanity treats cancer, autoimmune disease, and inflammatory conditions. He was knighted in 2004 for services to science.
Nobel Prize speaker Sir Gregory Winter shared the 2018 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with George P. Smith and Frances Arnold for his work on the phage display of peptides and antibodies. His contributions to the prize represent two distinct and commercially transformative inventions. The first, developed in 1986, was the technique for humanizing rodent antibodies — replacing the mouse-derived portions of monoclonal antibodies with human sequences so that the immune system would not reject them, making the entire class of antibody therapeutics viable in human patients. The second was his development, beginning in 1989, of methods to generate fully human antibodies using phage display libraries — eliminating the need for animal-derived starting materials altogether and enabling the development of therapeutic antibodies against human self-antigens that would otherwise trigger anti-mouse immune reactions.
The clinical and commercial consequences of these inventions are extraordinary. Winter’s humanization techniques enabled the development of alemtuzumab (Campath-1H), trastuzumab (Herceptin), bevacizumab (Avastin), palivizumab (Synagis), and pembrolizumab (Keytruda) — collectively representing some of the most widely used and economically significant medicines in oncology, immunology, and virology. His fully human antibody platform, developed through Cambridge Antibody Technology, led directly to adalimumab — marketed as Humira — the first fully human monoclonal antibody approved by the FDA and, for over a decade, the best-selling drug in pharmaceutical history.
A Serial Biotech Founder and Entrepreneur
Winter’s scientific career has been matched by an equally remarkable entrepreneurial one. He co-founded Cambridge Antibody Technology in 1989 — floated on the London Stock Exchange in 1997 and acquired by AstraZeneca in 2006 for £702 million. He founded Domantis in 2000 to pioneer domain antibody therapeutics, acquired by GlaxoSmithKline in 2006. And in 2009, he co-founded Bicycle Therapeutics, a NASDAQ-listed clinical-stage company developing bicyclic peptide conjugates as targeted cancer therapies. Bicycle raised $555 million in a 2024 equity financing, bringing its balance sheet to approximately $1 billion — a reflection of the continued scientific and commercial credibility of Winter’s foundational work. He has also served on the boards of bit.bio and advised biotech venture funds.
As a speaker, Sir Gregory Winter offers a perspective that is almost impossible to replicate: that of a foundational inventor whose work has been embedded in hundreds of billions of dollars of medicines used by millions of patients, combined with the reflective wisdom of a scientist-entrepreneur who has spent forty years bridging the gap between academic discovery and clinical application. His talks are equally compelling for pharmaceutical executives, biotech investors, academic researchers, and innovation leaders seeking to understand how science translates into transformative real-world impact.
Gregory Winter Speaking Videos
Sir Gregory Winter - The Science Business and Future of Antibody Pharmaceuticals
Sir Gregory Winter: Nobel Lecture in Chemistry 2018
Gregory Winter Keynote Topics
In the early 1980s, the idea of using antibodies as precision medicines was compelling but practically blocked — mouse-derived antibodies triggered immune rejection in human patients, limiting their clinical utility. Winter's solution — genetic engineering to humanize the antibodies, and later to make them fully human — opened a therapeutic frontier that has since yielded dozens of blockbuster drugs and reshaped oncology, immunology, and virology. In this keynote, Winter tells the story from the inside: the scientific reasoning, the patent battles, the company-building, and the Nobel recognition — and reflects on what it means for a single series of laboratory insights to generate medicines that reach hundreds of millions of patients. Essential listening for pharmaceutical, biotech, healthcare, and innovation audiences.
The central insight of Winter's Nobel Prize-winning work is that evolution — the process that generated all of life's molecular diversity — can be harnessed, directed, and accelerated in the laboratory to produce proteins with precisely targeted therapeutic functions. In this keynote, he explains the principles behind phage display and directed evolution, how they were applied to antibody engineering, and what they continue to enable as AI-assisted protein design and synthetic biology expand the drug discovery toolkit. A scientifically rigorous and conceptually compelling keynote for life sciences, research, and innovation audiences who want to understand the platform that underpins modern biologic medicines.
For four decades, Sir Gregory Winter has navigated a dual career as a research scientist at Cambridge and a serial biotech entrepreneur whose companies have been acquired by two of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies. In this keynote, he reflects on the architecture of that journey: why he founded companies not to make money but to see his inventions used in patients; what the key decisions were at each stage; how to manage the tension between academic freedom and commercial urgency; and what the Cambridge model of technology translation — from the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology to a global industry worth hundreds of billions — reveals about the conditions that make science-to-medicine translation possible. A thoughtful, candid, and genuinely inspiring keynote for research institutions, innovation leaders, and biotech investors.
Humira and Herceptin were the first generation. The next generation of precision medicines — including bicyclic peptides, antibody-drug conjugates, and AI-designed proteins — represents a new wave of therapeutic opportunity that is only beginning to emerge. Winter draws on his current work with Bicycle Therapeutics and his involvement in cutting-edge cell therapy companies to map what he believes the next decade will yield: which platform technologies are most promising, where AI is genuinely accelerating discovery rather than overpromising, and what clinical and commercial milestones will define the leaders from the followers. A forward-looking, credibility-rich keynote for pharmaceutical, biotech, and investor audiences who want to understand the next era of precision medicine from one of its founding architects.
FAQs on Booking Gregory Winter
Why Gregory Winter?
Booking Sir Gregory Winter means bringing the scientist whose inventions literally underpin the modern antibody therapeutics industry — not one drug, but the platform technologies that made Humira, Herceptin, Avastin, Keytruda, and dozens of other blockbuster medicines possible. He is a 2018 Nobel Laureate, a 2024 Copley Medallist, a serial biotech founder whose companies have been acquired by AstraZeneca and GSK, and a speaker whose story connects academic curiosity with pharmaceutical impact in a way that no amount of case studies can replicate. For pharmaceutical, biotech, life sciences, and innovation leadership audiences, Winter represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to hear from the originator of a technology that changed medicine. Aurum Speakers Bureau handles all aspects of the booking process.
What is antibody humanization and why did it matter?
Before Sir Gregory Winter's work in the 1980s, monoclonal antibodies used in medicine were derived from mice. When administered to humans, these mouse antibodies triggered immune reactions that limited their effectiveness and safety, preventing them from providing sustained therapeutic benefit. Winter developed genetic engineering techniques to replace the mouse-specific portions of these antibodies with their human equivalents while preserving the antibody's binding specificity — a process known as humanization. This breakthrough made the entire class of monoclonal antibody therapeutics viable in human patients for the first time. The humanized antibodies Winter helped develop — including trastuzumab (Herceptin) for breast cancer, bevacizumab (Avastin) for multiple cancers, and palivizumab (Synagis) for RSV — are among the most widely used medicines in the world.
How did Sir Gregory Winter's work lead to Humira?
Following his humanization work, Winter developed a second generation of techniques using phage display to generate fully human antibodies — proteins engineered entirely from human gene sequences and therefore free of the immunogenicity problems associated even with humanized antibodies. He co-founded Cambridge Antibody Technology in 1989 specifically to translate this platform into medicines. CAT partnered with BASF Pharma to develop adalimumab using phage display antibody libraries — a fully human antibody that blocks tumor necrosis factor, a driver of inflammatory diseases including rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis, and Crohn's disease. Approved by the FDA in 2002 under the brand name Humira, it became the world's best-selling drug. Winter's phage display platform also underpinned belimumab (Benlysta), approved for lupus — another direct commercial output of the technology he invented.
What topics does Nobel Prize speaker Gregory Winter cover?
Speaker Sir Gregory Winter addresses themes at the intersection of fundamental science, biotechnology, and medicine: how antibody engineering evolved from academic curiosity to one of the most commercially significant platform technologies in pharmaceutical history; the science and strategic logic behind directed evolution and phage display, and what they continue to make possible in the era of AI-assisted drug discovery; the entrepreneur-scientist model — how to found, fund, and steer biotech companies based on academic inventions while remaining grounded in science; what the next generation of biologics — including bicyclic peptides and cell-based therapies — may achieve; and how curiosity-driven research creates value that neither the scientist nor the funder could have predicted. His talks are particularly valuable for pharmaceutical, biotech, healthcare investor, and innovation leadership audiences. Contact Aurum Speakers Bureau to discuss the ideal format for your event.
How to book Gregory Winter as a keynote speaker?
Aurum Speakers Bureau can help you book Gregory Winter as a speaker for your next event, conference, or board meeting. Simply fill out our contact form to inquire about Gregory Winter's availability for a speaking engagement. One of our booking agents will respond to your request immediately and contact the speaker to let them know you want to hire them. We will assist you with obtaining speaking fees, booking information, and confirming availability for Gregory Winter or any other top keynote speaker or celebrity of your choice.
How much is Gregory Winter speaking fee?
Gregory Winter speaking fees are determined by several factors, including the event's date, whether it's a virtual or in-person event, the duration, format, preparation required for their speech, and more. The same applies to the cost to hire any other top expert speakers and celebrities. The Speaker Fee Range listed on our website is simply a guideline and is subject to change without notice. If you would like to hire Gregory Winter to deliver a keynote speech for your event, please fill out the contact form or email us at info@aurumbureau.com with as much detail as possible. One of our experienced agents will get in touch with you and let you know exactly how much it will cost to book Gregory Winter.
How can I contact Gregory Winter?
We only work with Gregory Winter on paid speaking engagements. Aurum Speakers Bureau can assist you in booking Gregory Winter and will handle all negotiations, contracts, and logistics associated with having Gregory Winter speak at your event. We will be your sole point of contact throughout the process. Get in touch with Aurum Speakers Bureau today, and we will reach out to any motivational speaker or celebrity you want to enquire about speaking at your event. If you wish to contact Gregory Winter for any other reason, we will be unable to assist you as we are not authorized to provide personal contact information.
Can I book Gregory Winter for a virtual keynote?
Yes, Gregory Winter is available for virtual keynotes and webinars. To book Gregory Winter for a virtual event, please complete the contact form or send us an email to inquire about the special fees for virtual engagements.
