Breaking ground in Global Health

Manjunatha (“Manju”) Ujjini aims to discover medicines for the world’s most underserved patients.

Trained as a microbiologist, he joined Novartis nearly two decades ago and has worked across tuberculosis (TB), malaria, dengue, and other high‑burden diseases. Today, he leads a Global Health drug discovery team that turns early scientific ideas into potential new medicines, partnering across biology, chemistry, and technology to move faster from lab to clinic.

As Novartis’ Global Health team enters a new era, with a string of recent successes in malaria over the last year and a move to a centralized, west coast Biomedical Research center on the horizon, we asked Manju to share his thoughts on the opportunities ahead.

Can you tell us about your career journey?

I joined Novartis almost nineteen years ago as a scientist working on TB, then expanded into malaria and dengue.

That's where I had an opportunity to start an early research program in a new indication for Novartis called cryptosporidiosis, a parasitic diarrheal disease that predominantly affects young children in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).

After we moved our operations from Singapore to the US west coast, I was able to expand my role not just into one new disease area, but all of our Global Health research areas as the Head of the team’s Lead Discovery group, driving early discovery all the way from assay development, to screening, to preclinical drug candidate development.

How has Global Health research changed during your time at Novartis?

It’s become much more impact‑driven during my career. What started as an early drug discovery-focused effort at Novartis has evolved into an integrated, patient-centric, innovative organization designed to deliver breakthrough treatments. We’re now operating with a clear strategic focus not only on research but also on clinical development, patient impact, and access.

Overall, this transformation has been incredibly rewarding. It has broken down disease area silos in our teams and has provided flexibility to address more unmet global health needs.

Seeing that entire journey—when a molecule you make in the labs shows potential in patients in a clinical trial—that’s definitely been meaningful for us.

This past year has been active at Novartis in the malaria space. What has it meant for your team?

I was just talking to my team about this after the Phase III data for our next-generation antimalarial candidate came out. Seeing that entire journey—when a molecule you make in the labs shows potential in patients in a clinical trial—that’s definitely been meaningful for us. It’s even more impactful when you consider the risk of antimalarial drug resistance, which is an area of real concern. If we get widespread resistance to existing antimalarials, having a new therapeutic option in place would make an enormous difference for global health.

For those of us working in early drug discovery, it's inspiring to think we could have that kind of transformative impact. It definitely pushes us to do more, not just in malaria but in other diseases we're working on as well.

What would you say you’re most proud of?

I’m most proud that we kept going when it would have been easy to stop. Back in 2007, when we were working on malaria, many felt existing treatments were sufficient. “Why do more?” But early signs of drug resistance in Southeast Asia warned us that if resistance spread to Africa, we risked returning to the treatment challenges we were still seeing in the 1960s and ’70s.

I'm also proud that our Global Health team never stops trying to identify unmet medical needs to see what else is possible. I would point to cryptosporidiosis for example, because it wasn't on the radar for many organizations. We took it up. We saw an opportunity to repurpose one of the targets that we had worked on in malaria, and now we have a drug candidate in clinical development.

So that is what I’m most proud of, that we have had this bigger vision at Novartis and the commitment to take big chances and invest in areas that could have long-term benefits for global health.

[I am] proud that our Global Health team never stops trying to identify unmet medical needs to see what else is possible.

What’s next?

Dengue is a major focus for our team now. There is a significant medical need, and we have multiple programs that we’re working on in our pipeline.

At the same time, we’re pushing malaria research forward, exploring opportunities like a radical cure strategy for disease elimination and chemoprophylaxis to reduce disease burden. We’re also working in some other neglected tropical diseases such as Chagas, leishmaniasis and cryptosporidiosis where our work could potentially lead to new medicines and new drug combinations that could change the way we treat some of these diseases.

What excites you about the future?

AI is changing how we discover medicines. It helps enrich the libraries we use for screening so that you have a highly focused library for your target or pathogen of interest. I think that not only increases the chance of success but can also produce more high-quality hits, which makes our further optimization efforts more efficient.

We are also accelerating hit‑to‑lead and lead optimization by using AI to predict molecular properties and make structural modifications to our molecules more efficiently than traditional iterative chemistry workflows, to make decisions faster and shorten cycle times.

I am also excited about newer, emerging technology platforms like genetic medicines, RNA-based therapies, and advanced antibody modalities. This is opening up exciting frontiers for us—expanding the range of therapeutic possibilities that could further enable us to deliver breakthrough medicines in Global Health.

Is that one of the big opportunities you anticipate with the new facility in San Diego?

Two things stand out as we prepare to move into the new San Diego research center.

One is more opportunity for potential collaboration around these new modalities. Being co-localized with San Diego groups that have so much expertise with these platforms, I'm really looking forward to impromptu coffee break conversations around what they do and learning how we might apply that to the global health space. And it’s also a wonderful development opportunity for our team members.

Second is the opportunity to learn from other Disease Areas in Biomedical Research. While Global Health has historically focused on infectious diseases, many of the biggest unmet needs in low- and middle-income countries are now in non-communicable diseases—some infectious-disease-associated cancers and neurological disorders for instance. Working alongside teams in areas like Neuroscience and Oncology will make it easier to exchange perspectives and find potential synergies.