Hrvoje Petković, Slovenia

Dr. Hrvoje Petković holds a position of associate professor of microbial biotechnology at the Biotechnical Faculty, University of Ljubljana. He completed his PhD at University of Strathclyde (Glasgow, Scotland), followed by postdoctoral position at Biotica (Cambridge, UK).

He has over 20 years experience in microbial biotechnology, metabolic and biosynthetic engineering and drug discovery.

His expertise extends to the industrial strain improvement, process development, expertise in secondary metabolite gene regulation, mostly focused on actinomycetes hosts producing medically important drugs such as antibacterial tetracyclines and macrolides (erythromycin), immunosuppressant FK506 and anticancer rapamycin.

He led research groups and developed industrial processes which have been implemented at industrial scale.

Dr. Petković has been working for and collaborating with number of large pharmaceutical companies and specialized biotechnology companies.

In 2006 he co-founded a SME Acies Bio Ltd with 750m2 research facilities, today employing around 35 researchers.

Dr. Petković has led number of national, EU and industrially funded projects. He has extensive experience in project and IP management.

Dr. Petković is teaching at Biotechnical Faculty, at undergraduate and postgraduate level, including subjects such as Microbial biotechnology, Bioprocessing, Technology of secondary metabolites, Metabolic engineering and Industrial biotechnology.

He was mentor to numerous diploma, masters and PhD students. He is author of a number of high-impact scientific publications and international granted patents.