Jean-Louis Excler, M.D. is the Program Director of New Initiatives, identifying new partnerships and collaborations requiring in-depth analysis of the strategic and scientific value of proposed projects, identification of funding opportunities, translational implementation, and follow-up of selected projects in close collaboration with the different units and departments of IVI and the IVI offices in Sweden and Austria. He also continues to lead activities of existing projects across Group A Strep, iNTS, and COVID-19 vaccine development in addition to engagements with and within India and China. He currently lives in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic.

Jean-Louis Excler joined IVI in November 2015, serving as Head of Clinical Development and Regulatory until September 2018, then assumed the position of Program Director, New Initiatives.

Prior to IVI, Jean-Louis Excler worked as senior resident in Pediatrics at the Edouard Herriot Hospital in Lyon, then spent several years in Africa for the French Ministry of Cooperation as Head of the Department of Pediatrics in Bujumbura, Burundi, and as Head of the Expanded Program of Immunizations and Primary Health Care for UNICEF in Central African Republic. Since 1991, he worked extensively on HIV vaccine clinical development as Head of the HIV vaccine clinical development for Sanofi Pasteur, and then as Scientific Director of the Henry M. Jackson Foundation for the US Military HIV Research Program in Rockville, Maryland and in Bangkok, Thailand. He joined the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) in 2002 as Senior Medical Director in India and Switzerland until December 2012, responsible for the clinical development of several HIV vaccine candidates in India, US, Europe, and Africa. He has been serving as Senior Consultant for the US Military HIV Research Program (MHRP) (2010-2015) for advanced development of HIV vaccine candidates in Thailand.

Jean-Louis Excler did all his medical studies in Lyon at the Claude Bernard University, Lyon 1, Faculty of Medicine, France. He holds a Doctorate in Medicine, specialized in Pediatrics, and various degrees in Tropical Medicine and Parasitology and Epidemiology.