Gavin Corcoran, M.D. serves as Chief R&D Officer at Axovant. In his career, he has overseen successful drug development across multiple therapeutic areas, including neurology and psychiatry, and was previously chief medical officer of Allergan plc and Actavis. Dr. Corcoran was Executive vice president for Global Medicines Development at Forest Laboratories prior to the acquisition of Forest Laboratories by Actavis. Dr. Corcoran also served as head of Late Stage Clinical Development for Inflammation and Immunology at Celgene, and as chief scientific officer and head of R&D at Stiefel Laboratories. Earlier in his career he held leadership roles in clinical development and regulatory affairs at Amgen, Schering- Plough, and Bayer. He received his M.B. B.Ch. from the University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa and completed his clinical training in internal medicine and infectious diseases at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio.

His Irish heritage is from his great-grandfather, moving from Sligo in northwest Ireland to South Africa. He and his wife, Corcoran’s great grandmother, had 12 children, so up until about 35 years ago all of the Corcorans in South Africa were related. He has visited Ireland many times and has made it to Sligo several times for business. ♦