João Carapinha graduated from The University of the Witwatersrand with a Bachelor Degree in Pharmacy. Postgraduate studies include a Diploma in Manager Development, Industrial and Organisational Psychology and a Masters in Public and Development Management – Economic Policy and Public Finance. João has also studied macroeconomic and microeconomic theory for non-degree purposes. He has worked for Glaxo SmithKline and the Southern Gauteng Branch of the Pharmaceutical Society of South Africa.

João was appointed by the Minister of Labour (South Africa) to serve on the Board of the Health and Welfare Sector Education and Training Authority. João has also worked at the Department of Pharmacy and Pharmacology, Wits University as a Lecturer and Director of the Pharmaceutical Economics and Policy Programme. João was the Market Access Manager of Wyeth South Africa before he joined Roche South Africa as their Senior Manager: Market Access and Managed Care. João is the Vice-President of the Administrative Pharmacy Section of the International Pharmaceutical Federation and was the Chairman of the Health Economics Assessment Team (HEAT) of the Pharmaceutical Industry Association of South Africa (PIASA). João is also a guest lecturer at the Department of Pharmacy and Pharmacology, University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. João was recently admitted to the inaugural African Leadership Programme of the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD).

Dr Lynn Katsoulis has worked on scientific aspects of developing numerous drugs, served as regulatory contact for Cato Research's projects in the RSA and has managed various clinical trials. Lynn has completed a 10 month fellowship in drug development which included training on diverse aspects of drug development ranging from preclinical drug development through to compiling marketing applications. Lynn obtained her Ph.D. in Pharmacology from the Univ. of the Witwatersrand in 2000.

Dr Oleg Reva obtained a PhD in Microbiology in 1995 from the Institute of Microbiology and Virology in Kiev, Ukraine. He did a post-doc in Bioinformatics in at the Medizinische Hochschule Hannover from 2002-2004. Oleg researches new biostatistical algorithms and computer programs for functional and structural genomics. Oleg currently serves as the National Bioinformatics Network node manager at the African Centre for Gene Technologies (ACGT) Bioinformatics and Computational Biology Unit.