Sigilon Therapeutics Hires Glenn Reicin, Veteran Banking and Finance Strategist, as CFO

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Sigilon Therapeutics today announced the hiring of veteran banking and finance strategist Glenn Reicin, MBA, as Chief Financial Officer. In a significant expansion of its leadership team, Sigilon has also hired a General Counsel and experts in product development and translational medicine.

The new hires bring important skills to strengthen the team as Sigilon advances its Shielded Living Therapeutics™ platform to develop functional cures for chronic diseases such as hemophilia, lysosomal storage disorders and diabetes.

Joining the company in addition to Mr. Reicin: Matthew Kowalsky, Senior Vice President and General Counsel; Hozefa Bandukwala, Ph.D., Vice President, Platform Innovation; and Susan Drapeau, Ph.D., Vice President, Head of Device and Delivery Engineering.

“With these additions, we’re continuing to build an exceptionally diverse leadership team with deep strengths and impressive track record of developing products and creating value. That’s exactly what we need as we work to pioneer a first-in category class of new medicines to treat patients with chronic diseases,” said Rogerio Vivaldi, M.D., MBA, President and Chief Executive Officer of Sigilon. “We are thrilled to welcome Glenn, Matt, Hozefa and Susan to the Sigilon team.”

Glenn Reicin comes to Sigilon with a broad and deep background in investment banking, private equity and venture capital. He previously served as President and Founder of Greyrock Biomedical Advisors, which advised companies on financial strategy and M&A. Prior to Greyrock, Mr. Reicin was a Managing Director at Skyline Ventures, a venture firm focused on healthcare therapeutics. Mr. Reicin also worked as Managing Director at Morgan Stanley, heading their Healthcare Equity Research team. His sell-side career spanned 18 years, including 15 years as a top-three ranked analyst and six consecutive years in the top spot. Mr. Reicin holds a B.A. in economics from Brandeis University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Matthew Kowalsky brings a wide range of legal experience in the biotech space to his leadership role at Sigilon. Most recently, he served as Vice President of Legal and Corporate Secretary at Proteon Therapeutics. Before that, he was Senior Corporate Counsel, Rare Disease, at Sanofi Genzyme. Prior to Sanofi Genzyme, he was Associate General Counsel at Cubist Pharmaceuticals. He has also held similar roles at ARIAD Pharmaceuticals and Lantheus Medical Imaging (formerly Bristol-Myers Squibb Medical Imaging). Mr. Kowalsky started his career in the corporate and intellectual property groups of Choate, Hall & Stewart LLP. He holds a B.A. from University of Notre Dame and a J.D. from Notre Dame Law School. Before attending law school, he served as a surface warfare officer in the U.S. Navy.

Hozefa Bandukwala, an immunologist by training, has pioneered the translation of advances in the emerging field of immunometabolism for novel drug development. Before Sigilon, Dr. Bandukwala served as Head of the Immunometabolism Laboratory at Pfizer and was the Senior Director and Head of Discovery Biology at Rheos Medicines. Dr. Bandukwala earned a B.S. in biotechnology from the Indian Institute of Technology in Bombay and a Ph.D. in immunology from University of Chicago. His postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University focused on epigenetic and metabolic regulation of T cell functions.

Susan Drapeau brings more than 20 years of experience in both product development and business development across fields, including cell therapy, tissue engineering and medical devices. Most recently, she served as the Senior Director of Business Development and Strategy at Vericel Corporation. Prior to Vericel, Dr. Drapeau spent 14 years at Medtronic Spine running part of the biologics product development group. Previously, Dr. Drapeau ran the bone product development team at Osiris Therapeutics, focusing on allogeneic cell therapies in combination with biomaterials. Dr. Drapeau is a Director and former Industry Chair of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering. She holds B.S. degrees in chemical engineering and chemistry from Purdue University and a Ph.D. in chemical engineering from Rice University.

About Sigilon Therapeutics

Sigilon Therapeutics is a biopharmaceutical company creating functional cures for chronic diseases using its Shielded Living Therapeutics™ platform. To create Shielded Living Therapeutics™ product, we engineer novel human cells that we encase in a proprietary immune-shielding matrix and place in the body. These Shielded Living Therapeutics™ products then produce therapeutic proteins in a programmable and durable fashion, without generating fibrosis or immune rejection. Sigilon was founded and created by Flagship Pioneering in conjunction with Daniel Anderson, Ph.D. and Robert Langer, Sc.D., of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

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