KSQ Therapeutics Announces Appointment of Douglas Pagán as Chief Financial Officer

Published: Apr 16, 2019

April 16, 2019 11:00 UTC

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- KSQ Therapeutics today announced the appointment of Douglas Pagán as Chief Financial Officer. Mr. Pagán brings more than 25 years of financial and operational experience in the biopharmaceutical industry. He joins KSQ at a time when the company prepares to advance its first drug programs into the clinic in 2020, addressing optimal therapeutic targets based on its CRISPRomics™ technology. Additionally, KSQ announced the promotion of John Trzupek, MBA, PhD, Head of Corporate Development and interim CFO, to the role of Chief Business Officer.

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KSQ CFO Doug Pagan (Photo: Business Wire)

"We are delighted to welcome Doug to the KSQ team," said David Meeker, MD, Chief Executive Officer of KSQ. "He has exceptional financial and operational expertise, along with experiences across diverse biopharmaceutical companies, that will be extremely valuable as KSQ evolves into a clinical stage oncology company with multiple product candidates. By growing and strengthening our leadership team, we are further positioning KSQ to advance a broad pipeline of cancer medicines that have been generated from our proprietary CRISPRomics engine.”

Dr. Meeker continued, “The promotion of John Trzupek to Chief Business Officer is in recognition of his significant contributions in building KSQ. John joined KSQ in December 2015 as one of the first five employees of the company and has played an instrumental role translating the CRISPRomics™ screening platform into an industry-leading product engine.”

Prior to joining KSQ, Mr. Pagán was Chief Financial Officer of Paratek Pharmaceuticals, where he played a key role in transforming Paratek from a development stage company to a commercial company, and he had responsibility for finance, investor relations, strategic planning and SEC reporting. Under his financial leadership, Paratek raised more than $450 million in equity financing and maintained a strong balance sheet to support the commercialization of the company’s first antibiotic product.

Prior to Paratek, Mr. Pagán served as Vice President, Finance at Acceleron Pharma Inc., where he was responsible for strategic and financial planning, accounting, SEC reporting, treasury and financial operations, and he played a significant role in the company’s Initial Public Offering. Prior to working at Acceleron, he served in strategic and financial management roles at Biogen Idec and Bristol-Myers Squibb. Previously, Mr. Pagán worked in healthcare investment banking at J.P. Morgan, as well as pharmaceutical operational roles at Johnson & Johnson. Mr. Pagán received his BSE in Chemical Engineering from Princeton University and his MBA from Columbia Business School.

"I am extremely pleased to be joining the KSQ team as the company embarks on tremendous growth opportunities to advance medicines that will have a meaningful impact for cancer patients," said Mr. Pagán. “KSQ’s progress to date is impressive in demonstrating the power of CRISPRomics to rapidly generate a pipeline of cancer programs and to create new medicines with the potential for improved success rates and better outcomes for patients.”

About KSQ Therapeutics

KSQ Therapeutics is using CRISPR technology within a powerful drug discovery engine to enable high-confidence drug development. The company is advancing a pipeline of tumor- and immune-focused drug candidates for the treatment of cancer, across multiple drug modalities including targeted therapies, adoptive cell therapies and immuno-therapies. KSQ’s proprietary CRISPRomics™ drug discovery engine enables genome-scale, in vivo validated, unbiased drug discovery across broad therapeutic areas. KSQ was founded by thought leaders in the field of functional genomics and pioneers of CRISPR screening technologies, and the company is located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. For more information, please visit the company’s website at www.ksqtx.com.