Raja Shankar
Vice President, Machine Learning, AI and Technology Solutions, IQVIA

Topic: Transforming R&D with AI
Discover in Raja Talk how AI will transform life sciences over the next 1–3 years. In-silico simulations allow drugs and patient responses to be tested digitally, improving trial design, speeding regulatory approval, and enabling innovations like synthetic control arms and digital twins. Meanwhile, AI agents automate clinical trials end to end – from planning and execution to close-out – including documentation, monitoring, and patient management. Unlike most commentators on AI, Raja does not believe these advances will reduce the cost of clinical development. Instead, they raise quality standards, enable hundreds of simulated scenarios, and open entirely new possibilities – delivering better molecules, stronger evidence, and more successful clinical trials.

Dr. Adrian Schomburg
CEO and Founder, IZB-based startup Eisbach Bio

Topic: AI-First Drug Development in Oncology: Turning Biology into Decisions
AI is only useful in oncology R&D when it converts messy biology into crisp, testable decisions. In this talk, Adrian will show how an AI-first approach can tighten the loop from mechanism and biomarkers to combination strategy and trial design — so teams learn faster with fewer, better experiments. Expect a pragmatic view of what works today, where models fail, and how to build a development playbook that’s decision-driven, not data-driven