Takaaki Takai

President, Kyoritsu Seiyaku Corporation

Director, Carus

Takaaki is a charismatic figure who started Calmic Japan Limited, a joint venture with Rentokil Initial PLC UK, in 1969 and rapidly grew this into a successful business which employs 700 people with an annual sales turnover of £97 million. In 2011, Takaaki became the President of Kyoritsu Seiyaku Co. Ltd. Established in 1955, with 600 employees and a turnover of £310 million, Kyoritsu Seiyaku Co. Ltd is the number one animal health company in Japan and ranked eleventh globally. He values relationships with people and has an extensive network in multiple sectors which he uses to strengthen business development opportunities. Takaaki has a driven leadership style that is focused on achieving targets.

Tokiyoshi Sakakibara

International Business Corporate Planning & Strategy Division Director, Kyoritsu Holdings Corporation

Director, Carus

Toki has extensive experience in the pharmaceutical industry with more than 30 years with Japanese pharma company, Mitsubishi Tanabe Pharma Corporation (formerly Tanabe Seiyaku Corporation).

Initially, he was involved in a range of tasks, including sales and marketing, regulatory affairs, and business development. He has worked globally in Asia, Europe (including the UK), and the US. More recently his focus has been on the prevention and treatment of diseases.

A keen advocate of using data for key decisions, Toki’s motto is: work hard and play hard.

Ron Long

Chairman & CEO

Ron brings a wealth of experience from the Life Science and Pharmaceutical industry and sits on the Board of a number of companies. Ron began his career working for the Wellcome Foundation PLC for 22 years culminating in a number of Divisional Director and Managing Director appointments. These included serving on the Board of Coopers Animal Health, a top five global health company created following a merger between Wellcome and ICI’s veterinary businesses. The company’s Japanese partner was Kyoritsu Seiyaku.

Ron went on to join Amersham PLC as a Board member from 1990 to 2001, holding a number of senior roles including CEO of Amersham Pharmacia Biotech and Executive Vice Chairman of the Group.

Since leaving Amersham, Ron has held a range of Executive and Non-Executive roles with various Life Science Pharmaceutical and Diagnostic companies in the UK and Sweden. Ron is currently Chairman of Better All Round Ltd, Chairman and CEO of Euro-Diagnostica AB and Executive Chairman of Sky Medical Technology Ltd. Ron was elected as a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences, IVA in March 2010.

Issei Maeda

Director 

After graduating from university, Issei joined Suntory Foods Limited, a subsidiary of Suntory Holdings, one of the world's leading beverage manufacturers. Here he gained experience in sales and corporate planning before assuming the position in 2019 of director of Kyoritsu Seiyaku, the largest animal health company in Japan.

At Kyoritsu Seiyaku, he contributed to the growth of the company under the management philosophy of "Building a mutual path for animals and humans ." He later became a director of Kyoritsu Holdings, the holding company for Kyoritsu Seiyaku and Carus.

Issei also served as a director of several group companies and has led the transformation of the entire Kyoritsu Group, demonstrating his strengths of broad perspective, speedy and accurate management judgement and execution.

A father of two daughters he enjoys playing golf.

Jolian Howell

Chief Business Officer and Director

Jolian has over 20 years’ experience in the animal health sector with several leading companies including MSD, Zoetis, Pfizer, Novartis and Leo in a variety of commercial positions both in the UK and the EU.

Jolian began his career in animal health as a sales representative, then moved into marketing to manage the Rimadyl (Carprofen) brand. Following the creation of a central European function at Pfizer, Jolian relocated to Paris to take on the newly created role of European Brand Team Leader, launching both Cerenia and Trocoxil across the EU region.

Since 2007 he has led teams at a European level and been a member of the European Business Unit leadership team. This involved working in a variety of European marketing and strategic planning positions across multiple species sectors, to bring new medicines from clinical trial development to a pre-launch, and subsequently to full commercial launch. In 2010 he led the integration process between the Pfizer and Fort Dodge equine business units. This involved supporting local countries to develop operational teams and establish a business unit portfolio through new product development, phase IV planning, geographic expansion and licensing.

Following a return to the UK in 2013, Jolian led the marketing and technical team that oversaw the launch of Bravecto, a novel innovation in the ectoparasiticide sector. To further broaden his healthcare experience, he entered the human health dental sector with Simplyhealth leading the marketing team for Denplan.

Carus focuses on developing an innovation led portfolio and novel life science technology platforms for application in the animal health sector. Jolian is looking forward to shaping this strategy and partnering with organisations to achieve these goals.

Dr Rajesh Odedra

R&D Director

Experience: Raj has more than 17 years’ experience in supporting research and development activities for young life science companies, particularly in the fields of molecular biology and in vitro diagnostics.

After gaining his PhD at Manchester University, studying the mechanisms of blood vessel growth in wound healing, Raj moved to the Royal Veterinary College in 1991, as a Senior Research Fellow, to study pathogen-induced gastrointestinal damage and repair. During his tenure he developed and commercialised several in vitro diagnostic tests and set up a molecular genetics laboratory to study inherited disease in dogs.

Raj joined Nycomed Amersham plc in 1998 and was involved in innovating novel sequencing and genome analysis tools for the company. Upon leaving the company in 2002, Raj was retained as a consultant to support the progression of the Intellectual Property (IP) he had generated.

As a consultant, Raj has worked on projects including, IP development, managing proofs of principle studies to secure IP, preparing and progressing research and development plans, identifying commercialisation opportunities for novel technologies, and managing multi-centre grant applications.

Greg Firth BVetMed, CertVOphthal, PhD, MRCVS

Clinical Director

Greg is a veterinary surgeon with experience in both first and second opinion practice. He graduated from the Royal Veterinary College in 1992 and was appointed House Surgeon at Glasgow University Veterinary School. Following his return to London as a Wellcome Trust Veterinary Clinical Training Scholar, he was awarded a PhD and went on to work as a molecular biologist for Nycomed Amersham PLC.

Greg subsequently returned to a clinical career path, initially working in mixed general practice before founding a companion animal practice, of which he remains a director.

Paul Elder

Finance Director

Paul qualified as a Chartered Management Accountant in 2013 and has concentrated on the pharma sector since 2018, assisting the financial management of growing drug discovery companies.

The first 20 years of his professional career involved 10 years as an engineer in heavy industry and motor racing after which he founded, grew and exited a leisure business based in France, focused on winter holidays.

Having completed an MBA in 2010, he worked as a portfolio financial advisor, helping SMEs in the leisure industry, electrical goods distribution, commercial property, retail data and scientific research.

From 2018 he has concentrated on the pharma sector with finance roles for Domainex Ltd, a fast-growing, privately owned, contract research organisation and Nodthera Ltd, a private equity-financed biotech company developing a new platform of inflammation inhibitors.

Steve Long

Operations Director

Steve has over 30 years of business experience, predominantly in the engineering and construction industry. In his early career Steve worked in various capacities project managing complex construction projects around the globe. He went on to work in the engineering sector focussed on upstream oil and gas projects with a focus on project management, cost control & estimation and ultimately new business development.

Since leaving the sector 10 years ago Steve set up and ran his own consultancy company providing business advice, project management, commercial and contractual consultancy to start-up companies looking to scale by sustainable growth. Steve has worked with companies in a range of sectors including data storage, medical devices, life science and animal health.

Steve enjoys travel and has lived and worked in the USA, Middle East and Far East gaining a solid understanding and sensitivity to different countries and cultures.

Etsuko Hosaka

Director of HR & General Affairs

Etsuko has 20 years’ experience working in the pharmaceutical industry, initially in Japan for Amersham K.K. before moving to the UK headquarters in 1996 to manage the liaison office for the JV between Sumitomo Chemical and Amersham International PLC, (latterly GE Healthcare).

Etsuko has held various roles both in commercial and manufacturing operations, including business development, in-licensing, business intelligence, strategic development and quality management in the global supply chain – working with major manufacturing sites in the UK, Norway and North America for product supply into the Japanese market. Etsuko left GE Healthcare Ltd in 2009, taking up a consultancy role to manage pharmaceutical product supply, GMP quality management and auditing for her Japanese client, Nihon Medi-Physics Co. Ltd.

Hisanori  Ken Tsukahara

Corporate Development and Management Accounting Director

Ken has 15 years’ experience working in the business and IT consulting industry. He started his career with PwC Consulting which was then merged to IBM, and worked in its business consulting division for 9 years. He then worked at Accenture for 4 years, and another 2 years at KPMG. As a global operation and IT innovation consultant mainly in the business strategy, sales, logistics, and procurement areas, Ken has delivered nearly 20 projects to companies in various industries including consumer electronics manufacturer and e-commerce retailer.

From 2016 he joined Kyoritsu Seiyaku to start-up the UK subsidiary Carus in close liaison with the Japanese counterparts, and he transferred to Carus from its initiation in 2017. In 2024 he qualified as a Chartered Global Management Accountant (CGMA) from CIMA, and aims to utilise the gained knowledge and skills to provide clear visibility to the future outlook of the business and enable a well-informed business decision by the management..

Dr Sandy Primrose

Non-Executive Director

Sandy has more than 30 years’ experience as a director, chairman or consultant to early-stage life science, biotechnology and diagnostic companies.

After gaining his PhD at the University of California (Davis) studying the replication of bacteriophages, he undertook post-doctoral research on animal viruses at the Australian National University. After holding academic positions at the Universities of Edinburgh and Warwick, he joined a pharmaceutical company (GD Searle) where he was Director of Biotechnology and then Senior Director of Drug Development.

Sandy joined Amersham International as General Manager of their Life Sciences Division and later held roles as Director of New Business Development and then Technical Director. On leaving the company, he managed a food microbiology company and then an environmental diagnostics business. In 2000, he established his own consultancy business and his clients included many early-stage companies in the UK and US as well as UK government departments. He also served on the boards of the Microbiological Research Establishment and the Health Protection Agency and currently is chairman of uFraction8 and Inoviv.

Lucy Williams MRCVS

Marketing Manager

Lucy is a qualified Veterinary Surgeon, having graduated from the University of Liverpool in 2018. Lucy worked as a clinical vet in first opinion for over 5 years in both corporate and independent practices.

Lucy transitioned into industry by working for Protexin as a Veterinary Technical Advisor where she gained valuable knowledge of innovation initiatives, new product development, technical support and marketing strategy. 

Lucy joined Carus Animal Health in 2025 as Marketing Manager which combines her keen interest in internal medicine and gastrointestinal health and specialism in science-driven and creative strategy in the veterinary marketing space.

Dr Ben Swift BSc (hons), MRes, PhD

R&D Laboratory Manager & Senior Microbiologist

Ben has over 15 years’ experience in microbiology and applied life sciences, working at the interface of research, diagnostics, and real-world impact. He has supported the development, validation, and commercialisation of novel diagnostic and analytical technologies across veterinary and human clinical settings, including founding a company based on bacteriophage technology he invented.

Dr Hannah Patrick PhD

Senior Microbiologist

Through academia and industry, Hannah has over 20 years’ experience working with bacterial pathogens, focusing on infection, antimicrobial resistance, and the development of alternatives to conventional antibiotics. She completed her PhD at the University of Nottingham, studying quorum sensing and virulence in Yersinia pseudotuberculosis, followed by research associate roles at the Universities of Nottingham and Sheffield, before moving into industry in 2011.

Deepinder Kalra

Microbiologist

Deepinder is a microbiologist dedicated to improving animal health through innovative science. With a strong background in microbiology and biotechnology, she brings over four years of industry experience and a passion for bacteriophage research to Carus Animal Health.

Alexane Roux

Microbiologist

Alexane graduated from the University of Aberdeen in 2022 with a degree in Medical Sciences, specialising in Microbiology. She transitioned straight into industry, working with bacteriophages and developing skills in applied microbiological research.

Joy Bevan

Business Development Manager

Joy brings over 30 years of experience in the veterinary sector, starting her career in veterinary publishing before moving into industry roles supporting practices. A Qualified Trainer with a background in key accounts and commercial leadership, Joy is known for her practical, supportive approach.

As Business Development Manager at Carus Animal Health, she focuses on building strong relationships and helping veterinary teams get the best from the products they use.

Chloe White RVN

Business Development Manager

Chloe is a Registered Veterinary Nurse, having qualified in 2013. Chloe worked as an RVN in first opinion, referral and zoological practice for seven years before moving into industry.

Chloe has worked in veterinary nutrition for over ten years in education and business development roles and was published in the BSAVA Manual - Practical Veterinary Welfare with her chapter on Nutritional Welfare in 2023.

Chloe joined Carus Animal Health in 2025 as a Business Development Manager which allows her to continue to support clinics with CPD education to facilitate the adoption of new products. Chloe has also just embarked on being Carus's Sustainability Champion achieving her certificate in Carbon Literacy in 2025.

Georgie Louca

Business Development Manager

Georgie is a Business Development Manager with experience across both the human and animal health sectors. With an operational background and previous experience working within anaesthesia specialities, Georgie brings a practical understanding of complex healthcare environments alongside a strong commercial focus.

Since moving into the animal health industry, Georgie has partnered with veterinary surgeons and veterinary nurses to support practice development, focusing on building long-term relationships and aligning commercial strategy with clinical priorities.

Georgie joined Carus Animal Health in early 2025 as a Business Development Manager, where she works collaboratively with veterinary teams to support product adoption and contribute to positive outcomes for practices and patients alike.