BioSpace Movers & Shakers, Oct. 29
Biopharma and life sciences companies strengthen their leadership teams and boards with these Movers & Shakers.
BridgeBio Pharma – Hannah Valantine was appointed to the board of directors of BridgeBio Pharma. Valantine currently serves as a professor of medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine, where she has been a faculty member since 1987. Valantine was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2020 for her research in organ transplantation and her work to promote workforce diversity. At the National Institutes of Health, Valantine served as the inaugural chief officer for scientific workforce diversity, and as a senior investigator in the intramural research program at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. Prior to that, she was a professor of cardiovascular medicine and the senior associate dean for diversity and leadership at Stanford. Valantine co-invented the technology for organ donor derived cell-free DNA for diagnosis of transplant rejection, which is currently licensed and used to monitor patients for early detection of acute organ rejection.
Immunicum AB – Lotta Ferm was named chief financial officer of Immunicum. Ferm has been acting as interim CFO since February 2021. Prior to joining Immunicum, Ferm held senior management positions at Doktor24 Healthcare AB and Medivir AB in the healthcare and life science sectors. In addition, she has held CFO, Head of Finance and Head of Controlling positions leading a range of corporate finance accounting functions.
Currax Pharmaceuticals – Tennessee-based Currax appointed Ed Cinca to the role of senior vice president of Global Marketing and Strategic Alliance Management. Cinca’s role will be to lead worldwide commercial strategy for the entire Currax portfolio with a priority focus on Contrave (naltrexone HCl/bupropion HCl), the top prescribed oral weight-loss brand medication in the U.S. Cinca most recently served as a Novo Nordisk, Inc. (NNI) Leadership Team Member and Vice President, Head of Cardiometabolic Portfolio. He previously held the roles of Vice President of Sales Execution and Operations, as well as Senior Brand Director of Saxenda at NNI.
Onchilles Pharma – San Diego-based Onchilles expanded its leadership team with multiple appointment. Christopher Twitty, Ingrid Joseph, and Sonia Feau will be responsible for leading the development of first-in-class therapeutics based on novel neutrophil immune-biology. Twitty has more than 20 years of experience developing immuno-therapeutics and has held scientific positions of increasing responsibility at Bayer Pharmaceuticals, Cell Genesys, Tocagen, and OncoSec Medical. Before joining Onchilles as the company’s first chief scientific officer, Twitty was the CSO of OncoSec. Before joining Onchilles Pharma, Joseph was Vice President of Pharmacology and Toxicology at Synthorx Inc., which was acquired by Sanofi. Previously, Joseph served as Senior Director of Pharmacology and Bioimaging at Astellas Pharmaceutical Inc., and as Director of Oncopharmacology at Biogen. Prior to joining Onchilles, Feau was the Associate Director of Immunology at Oncorus, where she led the immunology group responsible for designing, optimizing, and evaluating new immune enhancer payloads. Before that, she proposed and evaluated several new immuno-oncology targets at Merck & Co. and Merrimack Pharmaceuticals.
Amylyx Pharmaceuticals – Stéphanie Hoffmann-Gendebien was named Head General Manager in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA). Hoffmann-Gendebien brings more than 20 years of leadership experience in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries with deep expertise in orphan drug development and commercialization. Prior to joining Amylyx, Hoffmann-Gendebien served as vice president, general manager, Europe, Middle East & Africa (EMEA) at Clementia Pharmaceuticals Inc. Prior to Clementia, she was the European director of strategic market development at Enobia Pharma and held roles of increasing responsibility in the therapeutics division Genzyme Europe BV.
Exo Therapeutics – Dorothy Lou Bailey was named head of Corporate Development and Strategy. Bailey served as an independent strategy advisor to Exo prior to this full-time transition. Prior to joining Exo, she worked as a corporate development and strategy consultant for VC firms and biotech companies. Bailey also served in positions of increasing responsibility, ultimately as Head of Corporate Development at Blackthorn Therapeutics. Before Blackthorn, she served as Principal at The Reckon Group.
Cytovation – Bo Jesper Hansen, the former chairman and chief executive officer of Swedish Orphan Biovirum, was tapped as a senior adviser to Norway-based Cytovation. He has held and continues to hold multiple senior board of director positions across a broad range of healthcare companies, both private and publicly listed. These include Laborie and Karolinska Development, Newron, CMC, Genspera, Azanta and Orphazyme as well as Gambro (acquired by Baxter), Zymenex (acquired by Chiesi), Hyperion (acquired by Horizon) and Ablynx (acquired by Sanofi).
NOXXON Pharma – Based in Germany, Noxxon tapped Bryan Jennings as CFO. Jennings has held the CFO position at a number of biotech and healthcare companies, including Peptilogics, KAHR Bio, Beren Therapeutics, Rational Vaccines and ChemomAb. Additionally, he was CFO and CEO at Vista Capital Advisors, a broker dealer based in New York.
Lumicks – Joshua Young will head up Investor Relations at Amsterdam-based LUMICKS. He was previously was a member of the senior leadership teams at Millipore, Bruker and Merck KGaA. Most recently, Young served as Vice President of Investor Relations at Everbridge, a SaaS software leader in Critical Event Management.
Travecta Therapeutics – Travecta named Donald C. Manning as chief medical officer and head of R&D. Pete Millligan was tapped as CFO and Peter Tate was named head of Singapore Operations and Business Development. Manning has over 25 years of experience in drug development and has held increasing levels of management responsibility in a range of pharmaceutical settings including Novartis, Celgene, Alpharma, Shionogi and Adynxx. Milligan has over 30 years of experience in a variety of finance roles across a number of industries. Most recently he was the CFO of Melinta Therapeutics, LLC. Before that, Milligan was CFO of G&W Laboratories. Prior to joining Travecta, Tate spent 10 years at EMD Serono, the healthcare business of Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany, where he led analytical chemistry, logistics and pharmaceutical development teams; progressing many molecules from exploratory research to IND. He began his career at Wyeth Pharmaceuticals, where he held roles of increasing responsibility. Additionally, Peter Honig, who recently retired from Pfizer as Senior Vice President and Head of Global Regulatory Affairs and Group Head of Development for China and Japan, was named to the scientific advisory board and the company also expanded its board of directors. New members include: June Bray, who most recently served as Senior Vice President, Global Regulatory Affairs and Medical Writing at Allergan; Ivan Gergel, a Managing Partner and CMO at New Rhein; Pascal Heberling, a partner at BC Partners; Bob Huang, an Executive Director at Tikehau Capital; and Charles Ryan, the current president and CEO of Travecta.
Rentschler Biopharma – Robert Panting was named General Manager of Rentschler ATMP Ltd. Prior to joining Rentschler ATMP, Panting spent 10 years at Fujifilm Diosynth Biotechnologies. His most recent role at the company was Vice President for Program Management and Sales & Operations.
Inscopix, Inc. – David Gray was named CSO of California-based Inscopix. The CSO role is a new position focused on leveraging the company’s proprietary technology and neuroscience expertise to discover and develop more effective therapies for brain disorders. Previously, he was Vice President at Cerevel Therapeutics, where he led the development of late-stage clinical programs for Parkinson’s disease (PD) and Alzheimer’s (AD) and was responsible for advancing early-stage pipeline programs. Prior to that, Dr. Gray held several roles during his 15 years at Pfizer, including Senior Director leading preclinical research teams and progressing programs from initiation to clinical study in multiple neuroscience-related diseases.
Celonic Group – Switzerland-based Celonic Group named Alexandre Pasini as its new COO. He will succeed Vikalp Mohan, who will continue to lead the commercial department as the new CBO. He joins Celonic Group after having served as Chief Operating Officer at SaniSure Group Ltd, a leading supplier of single-use technologies to the life sciences industry. Before joining SaniSure, he held, for more than ten years, several leading operational roles at Lonza Group Ltd, ranging from Site Director to Head of Global Bioscience Operations.