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George Yancopoulos

Co-Founder, President, Chief Scientific Officer & Co-Chairman, Regeneron

Search every verified George Yancopoulos interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. George Yancopoulos discussed Regeneron's research and development strategy in an October 2026 interview, contrasting it with an industry model where small biotech companies typically develop projects that larger firms later acquire. He stated that Regeneron conducts most of its R&D internally or with close partners, citing the company's rapid development of a COVID-19 antibody cocktail as an example of its speed and technology. He also mentioned that Regeneron developed a gene therapy for genetic deafness that he described as one of the most effective ever approved by the FDA, though he noted the patient population is small. Yancopoulos argued that artificial intelligence alone will not dramatically shorten drug development timelines without better data infrastructure. He proposed creating a comprehensive database of the entire U.S. population as a "moonshot" that could give the country a competitive advantage in biomedical innovation, while expressing that he did not want to disempower China but rather maintain U.S. preeminence. He emphasized the importance of elevating the industry's profile to attract top talent and empower future scientists with data.

Recent appearances

Notable quotes

“We developed arguably one of the most effective gene therapies ever approved by the FDA. This takes genetically deaf children and gives them normal hearing. It's life-changing. You take a kid can't hear anything. All totally normal. They can hear their mother say that they love them. They can start dancing to music. It's really, I'm incredibly honored and proud that our company was able to deliver this. But there's o”

“The way the industry largely works right now, it's driven by discovery in small biotech companies, each one working on one project. There's thousands of these companies. The odds are against each and every one of them. Less than one in a hundred ever comes up with an approved drug. And the bigger companies then acquire them, and that's how the industry survives. So, Regeneron historically and still now is very differ”

“If today we just as an industry just gave all of the drugs away for free, what would that do in the long run? That would kill the greatest innovative health care capability in history, which is that of the United States, which is not doing well enough as it is, but it's still the greatest that exists in the world. What we should recognize is yes, drug pricing and trying to be fair and responsible drug pricing is an i”

“I believe quantifiably maybe the hardest thing that we do as human beings. Look at the odds. 5,000 biotech companies in the United States, not to mention hundreds of major medical institutions, millions of researchers. Last year, 2016, 22 medicines approved by the FDA, only eight of them first in class. Most of them for orphan diseases treating just a few thousand people. Very few drugs really impacting lots of peopl”

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