Our team
Overview
Our Cambridge team brings together consultants, researchers and analysts with deep expertise across market access, health economics, forecasting, life sciences research, statistics and economic modelling, working alongside a wider network of specialist associates and partners.
Together, this expertise gives every project the right mix of skills and experience for the task at hand.
The team, led by Directors David Alderson and James Morris, works with pharmaceutical, biotech and life science companies globally to deliver evidence that informs real decisions.
As part of the Helios Global Group, our reach continues to grow and we are looking for people who want to help to shape that growth, bringing fresh thinking to complex evidence and access challenges. In return, we give our team the time, trust and support to do their best work.
Our team
Filter:
Abbey Child
Head of Market Access
Strategic Market Access
Abbey is Head of Market Access at Cogentia.
Her education includes a BSc in Human Biology (Loughborough University) and MPhil Public Health (University of Cambridge). Throughout her degrees, she covered topics such as evidence-based medicine, epidemiology and health policy.
In her previous role, Abbey was responsible for the design and facilitation of patient panels and advisory boards, and worked as part of a global team to bring non-drug patient solutions to the implementation stage.
Abbey has a wide range of experience managing and delivering across our strategic market access offerings, with a particular interest in opportunity assessment and strategy development.
At Cogentia, Abbey aims to integrate expertise from a variety of sources, resulting in the development of comprehensive market access strategy across all stages of the product lifecycle.
Alexia Martin
Analyst
Strategic Market Access
Alexia is an Analyst at Cogentia.
Alexia has a strong scientific background consisting of a BSc Medical Biosciences and a PhD from Imperial College London and The Institute of Cancer Research. Her expertise includes oncology and respiratory health. In her PhD, she developed methods to inform clinical treatment strategies for aggressive breast cancers without options for targeted therapy. She also has experience in driving financial policy change at the institutional and national level through primary research and stakeholder engagement.
At Cogentia, Alexia works on projects covering market access strategy, dossier development and payer / key opinion leader research.
Anne Collins
Analyst
HTA and Strategic Market Access
Anne is an Analyst at Cogentia.
She holds a BSc (Hons) in Biochemistry (Glasgow University) and a PhD in cancer biology from the University of Edinburgh.
Anne has over 20 years of experience in academia, where she previously held a position as Associate Professor in Cancer Biology at the University of York. Her interests included the use of systematic review methodology to identify the best evidence in preclinical research. Before joining Cogentia, she was an independent consultant carrying out systematic reviews and quality assessments of research practises for clients in industry and academia.
At Cogentia, Anne works on health technology assessments and market access projects.
Ben Wilding
Consultant
Health Economics and HTA
Ben is a Consultant at Cogentia.
His background includes a BSc Hons in Biochemistry from Cardiff University, with research focusing on Huntington’s disease.
Ben has 7 years of experience in health economics and outcomes research consultancy, focusing primarily on end-to-end health technology assessment (HTA) support, from strategy and value narrative development to submission writing and post-submission engagement. Ben also has experience developing various value communication tools, conducting literature reviews and expert engagement. His HTA leadership has had a particular focus on oncology and inflammatory disease, with experience across broader therapeutic areas including infectious disease, haematology, dermatology, paediatrics and rare disease.
At Cogentia, Ben’s work continues to focus on leading and supporting HTA submissions.
Catherine Åkesson
Principal Consultant
Strategic Market Access
Catherine is a Principal at Cogentia.
Her background includes an MA in Biology from the University of Oxford and an MRes in Molecular Biotechnology from Imperial College London.
Catherine has 17 years of experience in market access, encompassing project delivery, subject matter expertise and stakeholder engagement.
At Cogentia, Catherine’s particular interests include market access strategy and payer/clinician primary research.
Chiaodan Lee
Analyst
Health Economics and HTA
Chiaodan is an Analyst at Cogentia.
Chiaodan holds an MSc in International Health Policy (Health Economics) from the London School of Economics, and a BBA (Hons) in Business Economics from City University of Hong Kong. Skilled in cost-effectiveness modelling, systematic reviews and health technology assessment (HTA), he has hands-on experience evaluating COVID-19 policies, oncology therapies and innovative clinical interventions.
At Cogentia, Chiaodan works on economic modelling and supporting HTA submissions.
Daniel Harrop
Consultant
Health Economics and HTA
Daniel is a Consultant at Cogentia.
Daniel is a health economist with over 5 years of experience in health economics and outcomes research, specialising in health economic model conceptualisation and development and supporting statistical analyses. He has led the conceptualisation and implementation of global de novo cost-effectiveness models, focused on rare disease and oncology, as well as the adaptation of global models for local market submissions.
Daniel has extensive experience supporting health technology assessment submissions for the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, providing both strategic insight and technical health economic delivery across the full submission lifecycle. His work spans multiple geographies, with experience contributing to submissions in the Netherlands, the United States, China, and other international markets, giving him a strong understanding of global health technology assessment requirements and evidence expectations.
At Cogentia, Daniel leads projects across health economic modelling and health technology assessment, delivering both technical health economic analyses and strategic advice to support successful market access.
David Aitken
Senior Analyst
HTA and Strategic Market Access
David is a Senior Analyst at Cogentia.
David has a scientific background and holds a master’s degree in Molecular and Cellular Biochemistry from the University of Oxford. His research explored the interplay between metabolism, chromatin structure and gene expression in glioblastoma cell lines harbouring metabolic aberrations.
David brings with him a wealth of health economics and outcomes research experience, including the development and review of submissions to UK health technology assessment bodies such as the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence and the Scottish Medicines Consortium. His disease area experience spans multiple oncology (primarily haemato-oncology) indications and hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.
At Cogentia, David provides support across reimbursement dossier development, cost-effectiveness and budget-impact modelling, and expert-engagement activities.
David Alderson
Project Director
Strategic Market Access
David is a Project Director leading the market access team at Cogentia.
David has an MBA from Cranfield, a postgraduate diploma in marketing and is a Chartered Engineer.
His interest is in problem solving and developing integrated, evidence-based solutions to new and perennial access challenges.
He brings a wealth of experience from over 30 years in the industry, in many different multidisciplinary teams and companies, spanning industry and consulting and global and national roles. Prior to Cogentia, he worked for Evidera, GfK (now IPSOS), Bridgehead International, AstraZeneca/MedImmune, Novartis and GSK, and has been fortunate enough to be involved in a number of merger integrations.
At Cogentia, David’s focus is on market access strategy, pricing, due diligence and opportunity assessment, evidence development, value communication and messaging, ensuring that access is integrated into early development and portfolio decisions, and facilitating access for innovation.
Edmund Pezalla
Senior Advisor
US Advisor
Ed is a Senior Advisor to Cogentia.
Ed holds an MD from Georgetown University in Washington, DC, and Master in Public Health from the University of California at Berkeley. He has completed a fellowship in Health Services Research and Policy at the University of Michigan. He is also a board certified paediatrician.
He has a wide range of experience in healthcare in the USA as a physician with Kaiser Permanente and a senior executive at PacifiCare and Aetna, serving Aetna as VP for Pharmaceutical Policy and Strategy from 2007 to 2016. Ed focuses on US payer approaches to drug evaluation and pharmaco-economics and the impact that payer evaluations have on drug coverage payment in the US healthcare policy environment. He has 10 years of experience in strategic consulting on drug coverage for pharma-biotech firms, including conduct of primary research with US payers.
Ed has been advising Cogentia since 2018.
Evie Cooke
Senior Analyst
HTA and Strategic Market Access
Evie is a Senior Analyst at Cogentia.
Evie holds a BSc in Biochemistry from the University of York and an MPhil in Bioscience Enterprise from the University of Cambridge. Her MPhil dissertation investigated how gene therapy reimbursement models may evolve in the future across the US and EU5 markets.
At Cogentia, Evie works across our market access offering, implementing projects such as payer / key opinion leader research, market landscape and opportunity assessments, as well as health technology assessments and value communications.
George Hale
Consultant
Strategic Market Access
George is a Consultant at Cogentia.
George has an MSci (Hons) Biology from the University of Bristol, for which he undertook a self-directed research project and developed strong analytical and scientific writing skills.
His expertise covers partnering with clients to navigate the evolving market access landscapes in the UK, EU and international markets. He has experience project managing and delivering across a wide range of project types, including opportunity assessments, pricing due diligence and health technology assessment (HTA) strategy support. George works closely with clients to develop robust, evidence-based strategies that align with payer and stakeholder expectations.
At Cogentia, George balances his time supporting clients with their strategic market access needs alongside project management and delivery of HTA submissions to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, Scottish Medicines Consortium and National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics.
Gözde Yildirim
Analyst
Health Economics and HTA
Gözde is an Analyst at Cogentia.
She holds an MSc with distinction in International Health Management from Imperial College, where she specialised in health economics, healthcare policy and financing. Following her MSc, she also completed an Econometrics and Big Data course at the London School of Economics and Political Science, where she practiced methods of applied econometric analysis.
In previous roles, Gözde has been involved in projects for global pharmaceutical firms and gained experience in building cost-effectiveness models and conducting systematic reviews. She also has 7 years of extensive sales and product experience, during which she excelled in client management and pricing strategies.
At Cogentia, Gözde continues this trend, working on economic modelling and supporting clients with health technology assessment submissions.
Iustina Chirila
Analyst
Health Economics and HTA
Iustina is an Analyst at Cogentia.
Iustina graduated with distinction from the London School of Economics and Political Science, where she studied International Health Policy (Health Economics). Her dissertation focused on adapting a cost-effectiveness model for a vaccination strategy in an emerging market, commissioned by a global pharmaceutical company. Prior to joining Cogentia, she worked as a Research Associate at a pharmaceutical company, supporting the global vaccines health economics and outcomes research team. Her responsibilities included cost-effectiveness modelling, conducting systematic literature reviews and contributing to various research projects.
At Cogentia, Iustina works on health technology assessment submissions and economic modelling.
James Morris
Director
Health Economics and HTA
James is Founder and Director at Cogentia, having established the company in 2010.
James has a Master in Public Health and is a Fellow of the Royal Society for Public Health.
Prior to setting up Cogentia, James worked in industry for over 10 years, including European and UK leadership roles in health technology assessment (HTA) and health economics and outcomes research in big pharma. James has led on well over 150 HTAs across multiple European markets and therapeutic areas, encompassing all aspects from early model development through to pricing negotiations and appeals.
At Cogentia, James’ focus is on early value assessment, including conceptual and early economic modelling, and comprehensive HTA support from submission strategy through to post-submission consultation.
Jingwen Li
Analyst
Strategic Market Access
Jingwen is an Analyst at Cogentia.
She holds a BSc in Biomedical Sciences from University College London and recently completed her MSc in International Health Policy at London School of Economics and Political Science. Her dissertation explored the adaptation of a global cost-effectiveness model across key European countries for a vaccine in development, in collaboration with a global pharmaceutical company. She also has prior experience in reimbursement access strategies, including market landscaping, product positioning and pricing analysis, gained at a leading consulting firm.
At Cogentia, Jingwen supports market access projects and health economic modelling.
Joanna Todd
Consultant
Strategic Market Access and HTA
Joanna is a Consultant at Cogentia.
She has a PhD in Natural Sciences (Biochemistry) from the University of Cambridge and a degree in Biochemistry from the University of Southampton.
Joanna is a medical writer with over 20 years of experience in industry and as an independent consultant. Joanna has worked on multiple health technology assessment (HTA) submissions and market access documents across a range of therapeutic areas.
At Cogentia, Joanna works across a range of HTA and market access projects, utilising her passion for clear and concise communication.
Joshua Soboil
Consultant
Health Economics and HTA
Joshua is a Consultant at Cogentia.
Joshua holds a Master of Public Health in Health Economics from the University of Cape Town. He is a founding member and former co-chair of R for Health Technology Assessment (R-HTA) in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), the LMIC chapter of the global R-HTA Consortium.
He has extensive expertise in health economics, specialising in health technology assessment (HTA) and decision modelling. He leverages this expertise and his experience across a breadth of disease areas to support clients in building compelling economic evidence for HTA submissions.
Joshua’s methodological interests include novel HTA approaches such as distributional cost-effectiveness analysis and Bayesian methods for decision modelling and evidence generation.
At Cogentia, Joshua works across the full spectrum of health economic evidence generation, from statistical programming and building cost-effectiveness models to shaping the clinical and economic value story for HTA submissions.
Jules Barker-Yip
Senior Consultant
Health Economics and HTA
Jules is a Senior Consultant at Cogentia.
Jules has a degree in Human Sciences (University College London) and a master’s degree in Economic Evaluation in Healthcare (City University). Her master’s dissertation was a cost-utility analysis of orlistat (in conjunction with diet) compared with diet alone in the treatment of obesity in adults without comorbidities, from a UK National Health Service payer perspective.
Jules’ background is in healthcare and her pharmaceutical industry experience spans communications, marketing, medical education and patient engagement. Her therapy area knowledge includes cardiology, women’s health, hepatology, sexual health, neurology, mental health and oncology.
At Cogentia, Jules works across a breadth of market access and evidence synthesis projects, with particular interest in health technology assessment, value communications, access preparation and negotiations.
Mark Orchard
Principal Consultant
Strategic Market Access
Mark is a Principal at Cogentia.
Mark holds a BSc in Biology from the University of Lincoln.
He has a wealth of experience project managing and delivering across a broad range of market access activities, including pricing analysis and strategic market access, as well as comprehensive health technology assessment (HTA) support, from development of HTA strategy through to delivering reimbursement.
Prior to this, Mark worked in industry in the commercial department at AstraZeneca. Working in commercial gave Mark a unique grounding in the relationship between clinical and commercial, and how effective communication can translate clinical value into commercial delivery. Mark has a special interest in strategic market access work, helping clients to develop a market-ready strategy, particularly in the rare disease space.
At Cogentia, Mark splits his time between supporting clients with strategic market access and project managing HTA submissions to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, Scottish Medicines Consortium and National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics.
Matias Ricci Perez
Consultant
Strategic Market Access
Matias is a Consultant at Cogentia.
Matias holds an MBA from Manchester University and a MSc in Molecular Genetics from the University of Chile.
He has experience across multiple healthcare-related industries and geographies, combining science and business. He was responsible for strategic marketing at global pharma companies in South America, as well as managed R&D services in the biotech industry in UK. His therapy area expertise is immunology and oncology.
At Cogentia, Matias works across a plethora of market access functions and possesses a keen interest in strategic market access, including opportunity assessment, payer / key opinion leader market research, drug pricing and forecasting.
Mia Lavergata
Analyst
Market Access and HTA
Mia is an Analyst at Cogentia.
Mia has recently graduated from the University of Bristol with a BSc (Hons) in Neuroscience, where her dissertation investigated the therapeutic potential of disease-modifying therapy in treatment-resistant depression, with a particular focus on the role of neurogenesis in mediating its proposed antidepressant effects.
Throughout her studies, Mia developed expertise in the statistical analysis of scientific data and the evaluation of novel scientific evidence. Her academic experience spans multiple disciplines, including pharmacology, neuroscience, integrative physiology and anatomy.
At Cogentia, Mia supports strategic market access, payer / key opinion leader research and health technology assessment dossier development.
Neil Davies
Senior Consultant
Health Economics and HTA
Neil is a Senior Consultant at Cogentia.
He holds an MSc in Health Economics from the University of York and a BSc in Economics from Lancaster University.
Neil has several years of experience as a health economist in consultancy settings, where he has developed a wide range of economic models across the full lifecycle of treatments, from early cost-effectiveness models supporting pricing strategy to technically complex models for health technology assessment submissions. He has also created budget-impact and clinical-capacity models to facilitate the successful uptake and sustained use of therapies following launch in global markets.
His experience spans multiple therapeutic areas, including oncology, nephrology, respiratory disease, haematology, neuromuscular conditions, and rare or orphan disorders.
At Cogentia, Neil applies his technical expertise and broad therapeutic knowledge to develop economic models that support products throughout their lifecycle.
Oscar Wright
Analyst
Health Economics and HTA
Oscar is an Analyst at Cogentia.
Oscar’s education includes an MSc in Health Economics (City University of London) and a BA in History and Archaeology (University of Sheffield). As part of his MSc, he covered topics such as health economics, epidemiology and economic evaluation, and conducted a systematic literature review on methods for economic evaluations of companion diagnostics used in conjunction with targeted oncology treatments.
At Cogentia, Oscar works across our market access offerings, assisting with value communications, payer / key opinion leader research, market landscape and opportunity assessments. He has prior consulting experience working on opportunity assessments and decision modelling.
Samuel Scott-Dearing
Analyst
Strategic Market Access
Samuel is an Analyst at Cogentia.
Samuel is currently undertaking a Year in Industry placement with Cogentia before returning to complete his Economics and Geography BA at Leeds University. He is applying his foundational knowledge of economics and data analytics to the role, gained from work experience with the Imperial College London Institute for Global Health Innovation and completion of undergraduate modules including health economics and economic policy.
At Cogentia, Samuel supports our teams on projects across health economics and market access strategy.
Sophie Fox-Gmuer
Analyst
Strategic Market Access
Sophie is an Analyst at Cogentia.
Sophie graduated with a distinction in MSc Big Data Biology from Cardiff University in 2025, following a BSc in Biomedical Sciences. Her MSc dissertation focused on developing machine learning models to predict enhancer–promoter interactions using sequence and epigenetic data.
During her studies, Sophie developed expertise in statistical analysis and data-driven research across a range of disciplines, including epidemiology, immunology, genomics and stem cell biology.
Alongside her academic studies, Sophie gained experience in strategic marketing and business development at a physiotherapy company, supporting business growth, customer engagement and market development initiatives.
At Cogentia, Sophie supports health technology assessment submissions and market access research.
Suchismita Biswas
Senior Analyst
Health Economics and HTA
Suchismita is a Senior Analyst at Cogentia.
Suchismita holds an MSc in International Health Policy (Health Economics) from the London School of Economics and Political Science, in addition to an MA and a BA (Hons) in Economics from Jawaharlal Nehru University, India. In previous roles, she gained significant experience supporting global pharmaceutical firms, primarily focusing on building cost-effectiveness models and supporting systematic literature reviews.
At Cogentia, Suchismita works on economic modelling and supporting health technology assessment submissions.
Thierry Tchoukouaha
Senior Consultant
Strategic Market Access
Thierry is a Senior Consultant at Cogentia.
Thierry’s academic achievements include holding a Master of Science in Molecular Biology from Toulouse and a Postgraduate Diploma in International Business from Grenoble Ecole de Management, both of which enable him to seamlessly bridge the gap between scientific complexities and strategic business approaches, providing comprehensive solutions for our clients.
Prior to joining Cogentia, he worked for a range of well-established access consultancies, including Dolon, ZS Associates and IQVIA.
At Cogentia, Thierry brings a wealth of expertise to our growing market access team. With a strong background in rare diseases market access, pricing and value communication, he brings insights and excellent problem-solving skills to developing access and pricing strategies.
Vanessa Buchanan
Head of Health Economics and HTA
Health Economics and HTA
Vanessa is Head of Health Economics and HTA at Cogentia.
Vanessa has a PhD in Oncology (University of Cambridge), an MSc in Economic Evaluation in Healthcare (City University, London) and a postgraduate certificate in International Health Technology Assessment (HTA), Pricing and Reimbursement (University of Sheffield).
Vanessa has hands-on experience of all aspects of economic evaluation, including decision modelling and evidence synthesis. She also has broad experience of supporting product development, pricing and reimbursement, and launch, including biologics, chemotherapies and orphan products.
Vanessa has held commercial development roles with Mayne Pharma (now part of Pfizer) and Adprotech (a biotech start-up specialising in biologics), as well as consultancy roles in BresMed (a health economics consultancy) and the Accenture pharmaceutical practice.
Victoria Zaitceva
Analyst
Health Economics and HTA
Victoria is an Analyst at Cogentia.
Victoria holds a Doctor of Pharmacy from Moscow State University and a MSc in International Health Policy from the London School of Economics and Political Science.
She brings a diverse range of experience, covering drug development, regulatory affairs and health economics. She has prior consulting experience developing de-novo economic models in Excel and R for pharmaceutical and medtech clients.
At Cogentia, Victoria works on economic modelling and health technology assessment submissions.
Yifei Wang
Senior Analyst
Health Economics and HTA
Yifei is a Senior Analyst at Cogentia.
Yifei graduated with distinction in Health Economics and Decision Modelling from the University of Sheffield in 2024, where she excelled at cost-effectiveness modelling in health technology assessments (HTAs), medical statistics and simulation modelling. Her dissertation focused on developing a microsimulation model in R for a global pharmaceutical company.
Before pursuing her master’s degree, Yifei gained extensive experience as a Senior Analyst at a global consultancy, working on market landscape assessments and market forecasting across various therapeutic areas, with a particular focus on oncology.
At Cogentia, Yifei works on economic modelling and supports HTA submissions.
Get in touch
We welcome conversations with prospective clients, collaborators and individuals interested in joining our team. To find out more about Cogentia, please get in touch.