NGM Announces Expansion Of Management Team
SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif., March 2, 2015 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- NGM Biopharmaceuticals, Inc., a privately-held biopharmaceutical company, today announced that Jeff Jonker has been named President and David Woodhouse, Ph.D., has joined the company as Chief Financial Officer, effective immediately.
"The expansion of our management team reflects our accelerated pace of growth across the organization," said William J. Rieflin, Chief Executive Officer of NGM. "Jeff has been part of the team since November, and his strategic business guidance has already proven to be invaluable in consummating our recently announced collaboration with Merck. David's financial expertise and broad perspective will be vital to the company as we continue to maximize stockholder value. I'm pleased to welcome Jeff and David to NGM, and I look forward to further building out the NGM team as we significantly expand our R&D organization to deliver on our collaboration with Merck."
Prior to joining NGM, Mr. Jonker was the Senior Vice President, Corporate and Business Development at Theravance Biopharma and Theravance, Inc. He previously served as the Chief Business Officer of Satori Pharmaceuticals and the Vice President of Business Development and Corporate Strategy for Gloucester Pharmaceuticals, prior to its acquisition by Celgene. He also held leadership positions in the business development and legal groups at Genentech. Prior to Genentech, Mr. Jonker was an Associate in the Technology Transactions Group at Wilson, Sonsini, Goodrich & Rosati, representing clients in the life science and high-tech industries. Mr. Jonker holds a J.D. from Columbia University School of Law, an M.LITT. from the University of St. Andrews and a B.A. from Claremont McKenna College.
"NGM's validated, biology-driven drug discovery approach, world-class R&D organization and strategic collaborations have laid the foundation for the company to mature into a fully integrated, independent biopharmaceutical company," said Mr. Jonker. "I am grateful for the opportunity to be part of such a dynamic organization and to help NGM advance its pipeline to bring transformative new medicines to patients."
Dr. Woodhouse joins NGM from Goldman Sachs, where he was Managing Director and Co-Head of U.S. Biotechnology Investment Banking. As a member of Goldman's healthcare investment banking group for nearly 13 years in the New York and San Francisco offices, Dr. Woodhouse's responsibilities included corporate finance and mergers and acquisitions (M&A) advice for the biotechnology, specialty pharma and diagnostics industries. In this capacity, he advised on several billion dollars in equity and equity-linked financings, as well as more than $90 billion in M&A transactions. Prior to Goldman, he worked in various business development and research roles at Dynavax Technologies Corporation and Amgen, Inc.
"I'm delighted to join the NGM team," said Dr. Woodhouse. "The combination of this world-class scientific team with strong operational flexibility positions the company well to generate significant value with its pipeline of novel disease-altering biologics led by NGM282."
Dr. Woodhouse earned a Ph.D. in Molecular Pharmacology from Stanford University School of Medicine, an M.B.A. from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth and a B.A. in Pharmacology from the University of California, Santa Barbara.
About NGM Biopharmaceuticals
NGM Biopharmaceuticals is a private biopharmaceutical company using a biology-centric approach to create novel biologics for the treatment of a broad spectrum of life-threatening diseases. NGM's lead compound, NGM282, is in a Phase 2b study for the treatment of PBC. NGM282 has received Orphan Drug Designations in the U.S. and EU, and has been granted Fast Track Designation by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for PBC. NGM has established collaborations with Merck, MedImmune, Daiichi Sankyo and JDRF. NGM is financed by The Column Group, Prospect Ventures, Rho Ventures, Tichenor Ventures, Topspin Partners and other leading investors around the world. For more information, please visit www.ngmbio.com.
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