The Member Spotlight is an ongoing Q&A series focused on getting to know the CASSS community. Today’s spotlight shines on Carmilia Jiménez Ramírez, President & Chief Consultant at Miliar Biopharma Solutions.
Carmilia has participated on many CASSS Committees over the years, including CMC Strategy Forum Latin America, CMC Strategy Forum North America, Consultants' Network, Symposium on mRNA, and WCBP. In 2017, she joined the CASSS Associate Directors and was nominated and voted into the CASSS Board of Directors in 2021.
Q. What was your motivation to volunteer with CASSS?
Attending the first CMC Strategy Forum Latin America in Brasil over 10 years ago proved very eye-opening as to all the work that still needs to be done in order to ensure accessibility to new modalities of medical treatment in underdeveloped countries. During my first attendee experience, I knew I wanted to be involved in this type of endeavor. The experience in this meeting was like no other: Presenters were open and offered their knowledge freely. We were in the same room, shoulder-to-shoulder interacting with industry experts and the very regulators that reviewed and approved our submissions, being able to talk to them 1:1 right there. The community felt like home.
Q. What do you do to relax? Do you have any hobbies?
I like the outdoors, especially the beach. I enjoy hiking, biking and stand-up paddleboarding.
Q. What's your favorite type of food or special dish you cook? Why?
Puertorrican food is pure goodness. One of my favorite dishes to make is "sancocho", which is a thick beef or pork stew, made with bone stock and full of green plantain, root vegetables or tubers such as taro, cassava, tropical sweet potato and yam.
Q. What is your favorite movie, tv show, music, or book?
Favorite movie: "Gone with the Wind"
Favorite book: "Brave New World"
Favorite music: Heavy metal
Favorite TV show: "Frasier"
Q. What famous person (dead or alive) would you choose to have dinner with? Why?
I would have loved to have dinner Felisa Rincón de Gautier (Doña Fela). I have always admired how she advanced the suffrage movement for Puertorrican women. I would spend hours conversing on all her "firsts": First woman Mayor of a capital city in the Americas, one of the first women to register to vote in Puerto Rico, first in establishing pre-schools in Puerto Rico.
Q. What’s your favorite travel experience?
My most enjoyable trip so far was a 2-week long trek around Germany, Czech Republic, Poland, Slovenia and Austria visiting off-the-beaten path towns and cities in between known spots.
Q. What would people be surprised to know about you?
I am a "metal head".
Q. How did you get inspired to go into science/biotech/pharma industry?
I always enjoyed Biology lectures in school and avidly read all I could about biological oddities and genetics. My father passed away when I was 19 years old from a very aggressive form of gastric cancer. I wanted to know everything about his diagnosis, the treatment he was given versus all the options available at the time. After poring through hundreds of pages from his oncologist, I decided that I would go into a field of research, more directed to developing and marketing medicines for cancer treatment.
Q. If you did anything other than your current occupation, what would it be?
I would probably be a "designer" travel planner. I would plan travel experiences for individuals, families, friends' groups, tailored to their tastes and common interests.