Gunnar Weikert is the founder and executive chairman of Switzerland-based consumer goods
company Nestlé’s corporate venturing unit, Inventages, which has $1.5bn under management. He
was previously global head for life sciences deals at Germany-based healthcare company Bayer.
At Bayer, he oversaw venture investments and collaborations “representing some of the biggest
deals between big pharma and biotechnology in the late 1990s”, according to his biography on
Inventages’ website. These deals included partnerships with companies such as Millennium and
Lion Bioscience. Weikert has a PhD in the field of metabolism from University of Düsseldorf, and a
master of business administration.