Mika Kakefuda Derynck, M.D.

Executive Vice President, Therapeutic Area Head Oncology

Mika Kakefuda Derynck, M.D. has served as Vir’s Executive Vice President since September 2024. Dr. Derynck is responsible for leading the Oncology Therapeutic Area, overseeing Oncology Translational and Clinical Development. She has deep oncology clinical development experience of all phases of development from preclinical, early development, through multiple drug approvals.

Dr. Derynck also serves as an Independent Board Member of Enliven, a publicly traded biotech company. Prior to Vir, Dr. Derynck served as the Global Head of Conditional Biologics at Sanofi where she led all of the development functions for the XTEN masking technology drug development including Regulatory, Clinical Science, Preclinical and Clinical Pharmacology, Biomarkers, Bioanalytical, Clinical Operations and Biometrics. Prior to Sanofi, Dr. Derynck served as Chief Medical Officer at Amunix and was instrumental for developing a pipeline that led to the acquisition by Sanofi for $1.2 billion. She has over 30 years of experience in cancer research and drug development. Her expertise in oncology drug development spans multiple therapeutic modalities, tumor types, through all phases of development. She has overseen the approval and/or global development of over a dozen drugs. During her tenure at Genentech/Roche she served as the co-Chair for Cancer Immunotherapy, GI/GU Franchise, Breast Cancer Franchise, Angiogenesis Franchise and China Oncology Development. Dr. Derynck was also a Senior Group Medical Director of Exploratory Clinical Development at Genentech, overseeing Early Development of the small molecule signaling molecules.

Dr. Derynck was an Assistant Clinical Professor in the UCSF Department of Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology and Division of Hematology / Oncology. She holds a B.A. from Boston University and an M.D. from Boston University School of Medicine. She completed an internal medicine residency at Johns Hopkins, followed by a fellowship in Hematology / Oncology at UCSF.