Nikhil Nayak has over 25 years of relevant health and life sciences experience with significant focus on strategy, marketing & sales, business development, global product management, operations, finance, quality management, and corporate communications. He has demonstrated ability to build companies & departments and lead high-performing teams through a successful start-up exit, major product launches, management of blockbuster brands and profitable life-cycle management initiatives with a patient- and consumer-centric approach. In his previous role as Chief Operating Officer at Confirm BioSciences, he successfully navigated a sale and exit for the startup company. As COO, Nikhil led the Strategic Sales and Retail Consumer Business Units as well as the business and product development, operations, marketing, quality management, and IT departments.
Prior to Confirm, Nikhil was the Chief Marketing Officer at Millennium Health, where he served as a member of the Executive Leadership Team. He led corporate strategy, product development, marketing, and corporate communications functions, reporting directly to the Chairman of the Board and CEO. After a successful crisis management and restructure in 2015, Nikhil created a strategic and cohesive product development and commercialization process at Millennium that delivered several successful product launches and profitable growth. Nikhil began his life sciences career at Forest Laboratories (now AbbVie), where he held a variety of positions of increasing responsibility in sales, marketing, and business development. In his final role at Forest, Nikhil served as Executive Director of Global Marketing & Commercialization, where he steered the successful approvals and launches of several products in Canada, Europe, and Latin America. He was the head of the Namenda franchise, accelerating growth to “Blockbuster Status” for this Alzheimer’s drug while overseeing future development programs. He was also instrumental in the successful launches of Bystolic, and blockbuster antidepressants Celexa and Lexapro, for which he was recognized as part of Medical Marketing & Media’s 2003 “Brand Team of the Year.”
Nikhil received his Bachelor’s degree in Biology from Washington University in St. Louis, and his Master’s in Business Administration with a focus on Finance, Marketing & International Business from New York University, Stern School of Business. Nikhil joined the San Diego Blood Bank in April of 2022.