Andrew MillerAndrew Miller has quickly made his first move after the technology he invented, KarXT, secured an FDA approval last week.
The regulator’s nod for Bristol Myers Squibb’s Cobenfy (KarXT) was a landmark moment for the schizophrenia treatment landscape, and it was the result of about 15 years of work from Miller and team at PureTech Health, then Karuna Therapeutics and then BMS, which bought Karuna for $14 billion.
Miller is stepping into the board chairmanship at Progentos Therapeutics, where he’s reuniting with grad school classmate Chris Loose, the startup’s CEO. The preclinical biotech emerged with a $65 million Series A in May to take forward Frequency Therapeutics’ former remyelinating drug for multiple sclerosis.
“We don’t have anything right now in multiple sclerosis that is really a disease-modifying treatment,” Miller said in an interview.
The Progentos board post is a part-time role, but Miller doesn’t have any immediate plans to become a biotech executive again. During his time at Karuna, he held various posts, including a stint as CEO from 2016-18. He had been on the board from 2012-19, and was operating chief when BMS penned its $14 billion deal last December. He’s also on the board of another PureTech-founded company called Entrega, which is trying to make peptides available as oral medicines, including the en vogue GLP-1 agonists.
“I don’t have any really defined plans at this point. I feel really content right now to continue to advise BMS on Cobenfy. It’s something that I spent a huge amount of my career and as an inventor of the technology I have a real personal connection to as well,” Miller said.
— Kyle LaHucik
Ken MillsFor 15 years, Ken Mills wanted to work on cancer drug development. But he was busy leading gene therapy biotech Regenxbio, an opportunity that he couldn’t pass up when he met Jim Wilson in 2009.
Now that he’s turned in the Regenxbio CEO hat, though retaining the chairman post, Mills is ready for his next venture. This week, he became CEO of antibody-drug conjugate and radioligand startup Tagworks Pharmaceuticals, which raised a $65 million Series A last year to develop its take on Nobel Prize-winning click chemistry. It had spent about a decade hunkering down after spinning out of Philips Healthcare.
Marc Robillard will no longer do double duty as both CEO and CSO. He’ll focus on the latter role as the biotech eyes clinical entry in 2025.
The new mission is quite personal for Mills. In college, he lost his roommate to a brain tumor.
“I graduated with a chemistry degree, I was always motivated to do so, but that event had a profound and almost traumatic impact on me,” Mills told Endpoints.
The experience lingered on him for years, but “AAV never presented itself as a solution for cancer,” Mills said, referring to the virus that Regenxbio is using in its experimental gene therapies for retinal, neuromuscular and neurodegenerative diseases. There are a few biotechs now exploring whether AAVs can be used for cancer gene therapies.
Last year’s Series A will be sufficient enough to get Tagworks’ TAG72-targeting ADC into Phase 1 next year for solid tumors and should also fund initial clinical testing of its HER2-targeted radiotherapy, Mills said. The nimble biotech will be more than 30 employees “relatively soon,” he added.
— Kyle LaHucik
Debbie Law→ One of this year’s Endpoints 11 winners, Xaira Therapeutics, announced on LinkedIn that it has named Debbie Law as CSO. Law was elevated to SVP and head of the non-clinical research and discovery biotherapeutics organization at Bristol Myers last year, and the Merck vet has been a CSO before at Jounce Therapeutics from 2015-18. With former Stanford president Marc Tessier-Lavigne at the controls and a gaggle of big names on the board (ex-FDA commish Scott Gottlieb, ARCH’s Bob Nelsen and former J&J chief Alex Gorsky among them), Xaira made perhaps the splashiest debut of 2024 with a $1 billion raise.
Christian Schade→ Christian Schade has left Flagship Pioneering to become president and CEO of Halda Therapeutics, the Yale upstart out of Craig Crews’ lab that’s developing “Regulated Induced Proximity TArgeting Chimeras,” or RIPTACs. Schade joined Flagship as a growth partner in early 2023 after six years as CEO of Aprea Therapeutics, continuing as chairman until Richard Peters replaced him in August 2023. Pioneering Medicines president Paul Biondi has taken over for Schade as executive chairman of Valo Health, and the new Halda CEO still chairs the boards at Sapience Therapeutics and Omega Therapeutics.
Keith Dionne→ Keith Dionne has found another CEO gig, this time at Luxa Biotechnology, a little-known company out of Fort Lee, NJ that has a Phase 1/2a trial underway for its retinal pigment epithelial stem cell therapy to treat dry age-related macular degeneration. Dionne ran Third Rock’s Casma Therapeutics from 2018-23 and is the ex-president and CEO of Constellation Pharmaceuticals. He left Casma shortly after its $46 million Series C round and was replaced by then-COO Frank Gentile.
Jane Rhodes→ London-based neuro biotech AstronauTx has selected Jane Rhodes as CEO and Magnus Ivarsson as chief translation and early development officer. Rhodes is a longtime Biogen vet who comes to AstronauTx after a five-year tenure at Alice Zhang’s Verge Genomics as president and CBO. Ivarsson has plenty of experience with some of the biggest names in pharma (Pfizer, Merck, AstraZeneca) and is the former head of CNS disorders for Alkermes. More recently, he was chief research officer for Aliada Therapeutics. AstronauTx nabbed a $61 million Series A almost exactly a year ago from a group of investors that included Novartis Venture Fund, Bristol Myers and MPM Capital.
→ Late Monday, IGM Biosciences announced that it would stop work in cancer and shrink its T cell engager pipeline to focus more on autoimmune diseases. The California biotech is also losing three key execs: CEO Fred Schwarzer, CSO Bruce Keyt and CMO Chris Takimoto. IGM’s president of its autoimmunity work, Mary Beth Harler, has stepped up to replace Schwarzer, having joined the team in 2021 after an 11-year stint with Bristol Myers. Meanwhile, Peer Review has learned that Takimoto is taking up a new CMO post at The START Center for Cancer Research.
Abbas Hussain→ Moderna has appointed ex-Vifor Pharma CEO Abbas Hussain to the board of directors. Hussain is in his first year as chairman of Swiss-based Asceneuron, which pulled together a $100 million Series C in July. The Eli Lilly and GSK alum also has board seats at Mallinckrodt and Alfasigma. The addition of Hussain comes three months after Moderna lost two board members: co-founder Bob Langer and Flagship’s Stephen Berenson. The Carlyle Group’s co-chair David Rubenstein joined at the time. Moderna said in September that it would reduce its R&D spending by $1.1 billion and would end five early-stage programs while slowing its roll in rare diseases. Its stock $MRNA has tumbled significantly since its Covid-fueled highs.
Katalin Karikó→ Modified mRNA trailblazer Katalin Karikó has joined the scientific advisory board at ReCode Therapeutics, along with ex-Verve Therapeutics CSO Andrew Bellinger. Karikó and University of Pennsylvania colleague Drew Weissman won the Nobel Prize in Medicine last year, and Ryan Cross spoke with her just before the announcement. ReCode has a pair of inhaled mRNA-based drugs in its pipeline: RCT1100 for a rare disease called primary ciliary dyskinesia caused by DNAI1 gene mutations, and RCT2100 for cystic fibrosis.
Tim Walbert→ Gary Glick’s Odyssey Therapeutics has added ex-Horizon CEO Tim Walbert and Ian Smith to the board of directors. Since the $28 billion exit to Amgen, Walbert has gathered up board appointments at COUR Pharmaceuticals and Sagimet Biosciences. Smith and Odyssey chairman Jeff Leiden know each other well from their days at Vertex, where Smith was COO at the conclusion of his 18-year tenure. Smith chairs the board at Rivus Pharmaceuticals, the obesity biotech that reported Phase 2a data this week.
Simon Cooper→ We’ll lead off a string of CMOs with Simon Cooper’s appointment at LifeMine Therapeutics, which revealed the hire on LinkedIn. Cooper jumped on board as CMO of Morphic Therapeutic just a few months before it was sold to Lilly for $3.2 billion, and he’s the ex-medical chief at Anokion, Kadmon and Keros Therapeutics. He replaces Elliot Ehrich, who will be a clinical and scientific advisor for Greg Verdine’s crew. “We’ve discovered an entirely new class of T-cell immunosuppressives that we think are going to really revolutionize — certainly will revolutionize organ transplantation by eliminating the CNS side effects of the current tacrolimus, the principal drug used in organ transplantation now,” Verdine told Endpoints News at this year’s JP Morgan Healthcare Conference.
Jorge DiMartino→ Protein degradation specialist Plexium has tapped Jorge DiMartino as CMO and EVP of clinical and translational development. DiMartino’s role was eliminated at Kronos Bio, part of a leadership reorg that also included CSO Christopher Dinsmore and COO and general counsel Barbara Kosacz. DiMartino had been medical chief at Kronos for more than four years. He also led the Epigenetics Thematic Center of Excellence at Celgene and was group medical director for Genentech.
Sheldon Sloan→ Spyre Therapeutics, the inflammatory bowel disease biotech once known as Aeglea BioTherapeutics, has recruited Sheldon Sloan as CMO after his retirement from Abivax. Sloan was the team leader for etrasimod, the ulcerative colitis drug he started working on at Arena Pharmaceuticals. He left Pfizer — which bought Arena for $6.7 billion — to take the CMO job at Abivax before the FDA approved etrasimod last year. It’s now marketed as Velsipity. In March, Spyre said it has enough cash to stay in operation “well into 2027” after a $180 million private placement.
Mark Bach→ Mark Bach has landed at Treg shop GentiBio as CMO after we told you in a recent edition that Blai Coll replaced him at Structure Therapeutics. Bach held multiple leadership roles over a 16-year period at Merck, including VP of global clinical operations, and he also spent a decade at J&J. He then had a brief stop at Yorvipath maker Ascendis Pharma as SVP, endocrine medical sciences, and joined Structure in 2021 when it was known as ShouTi. GentiBio CEO Adel Nada departed in January, according to his LinkedIn, and the biotech has yet to hire a replacement.
→ Michael Charlton has been named SVP, clinical development at Madrigal Pharmaceuticals, which has given the MASH field much-needed momentum. Charlton co-directed the transplant institute at the University of Chicago and is the former president of the International Liver Transplantation Society. FDA approvals in metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (also referred to as NASH) had been elusive until Madrigal’s Rezdiffra crossed the finish line earlier this year.
Han Choi→ Siddhartha Mukherjee’s Vor Bio has welcomed Han Choi as CFO. Choi had been a principal at Oracle Investment Management, a healthcare-focused hedge fund that led Pyramid Biosciences’ Series B round, and he has pharma experience with Bristol Myers as associate director, licensing and external development. Click here for Andrew Dunn’s in-depth Slack interview with Mukherjee.
→ Flagship’s Apriori Bio has enlisted Harry Kleanthous as CSO. He just had a two-year run with SK bioscience as EVP of vaccine R&D strategy and external innovation, and he’s the former head of research for North America at Sanofi’s vaccines division. Kleanthous also worked for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation as a senior program officer in global health. Last week, Apriori Bio added Seth Berkley, Ashish Jha and Arup Chakraborty to the board of directors.
Jan Adams→ Grünenthal CSO Jan Adams has replaced Novartis alum Janneke van der Kamp as the German company’s chief commercial officer. Adams came to Grünenthal in 2017 as head of corporate strategy & portfolio management and was elevated to CSO in 2020. He also had a brief stint with Takeda as head of R&D strategic management and planning. Van der Kamp had held this position since March 2023 and will be CEO of London-based Norgine on Jan. 1, according to a release.
→ New Haven, CT-based Trevi Therapeutics has brought aboard James Cassella as chief development officer. Cassella previously served in the same role at Concert Pharmaceuticals, where he helped lead the company’s autoimmune JAK inhibitor, Leqselvi, toward an FDA approval. Before that, he was EVP, research and development and CSO at Alexza Pharmaceuticals for over a decade. Cassella is taking over for CMO David Clark, who has stepped down to “help with the care of an immediate family member.” Clark will still remain as a consultant to the company.
Alison Moore→ California-based Codexis has picked up three new execs — and now has enough capital to last until 2027 after a $31 million infusion. Amgen vet Alison Moore is Codexis’ first chief technology officer and held this position at Allogene from 2018-23; finance chief Georgia Erbez had been COO of Walking Fish Therapeutics, the B cell therapy startup that recently closed its doors; and Zymergen alum John Schiffhauer hops aboard as SVP of intellectual property.
Charu Maini→ UK startup Nuclera, which is developing a printer it says can churn out protein models within 24 hours, has promoted Gordon McInroy to the role of COO, Tobias Ost to SVP, product development and Charu Maini to SVP of people. McInroy, who co-founded the company in 2013, previously served as chief technical officer. Meanwhile, Ost was VP of research and development and has experience from stints at Solexa, Illumina and Pacific Biosciences. Maini formerly served as Nuclera’s VP of people, having joined the team after gigs at Microsoft, American Express and PricewaterhouseCoopers.
→ Aligos Therapeutics has quickly followed up its appointment of medical chief Hardean Achneck by bringing in David Perry as VP of business development. Perry spent the last year as senior director of business development for Sangamo Therapeutics, playing a key role in the beleaguered biotech’s Alzheimer’s partnership with Genentech.
Steve Griffen→ Earlier this year, OMass Therapeutics hired a trio of leaders located on both sides of the Atlantic: Sanofi vet Steve Griffen (VP of clinical development) held this title for only a brief period at MBX Biosciences, the endocrine and metabolic disorder biotech that went public last month with an upsized IPO. Angela Hecyk (director of clinical operations) is one of Griffen’s teammates from MBX, where she was a senior clinical trial project manager, and she had a yearlong stint as a clinical trial project manager with Taysha Gene Therapies. Both are based in the US. Meanwhile, Stuart Hadley (senior director of CMC) works out of the UK and had a 19-year career with AstraZeneca before handling CMC responsibilities at F2G.
Gary Palmer→ Pliant Therapeutics, which is testing bexotegrast in patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis and primary sclerosing cholangitis, has introduced Gary Palmer as SVP of medical affairs. In his third stop at Bristol Myers, Palmer was SVP of global medical affairs, immunology & neuroscience. Elsewhere, he’s been SVP for medical affairs at Myovant Sciences and CMO for neuroscience with Eisai.
→ Oculis has named Daniel Char as chief legal officer. Char served in the same capacity at ImmunoGen, and prior to that role, he was general counsel and corporate secretary of Evelo Biosciences from 2018-22. Char’s appointment comes a couple months after Oculis shut down a Phase 3 trial of its lead eye drop candidate due to a third-party “administrative error.”
Paul Sekhri→ Resolution Therapeutics has brought in vTv Therapeutics CEO and former eGenesis chief Paul Sekhri as chairman of the board. Resolution, which is developing its macrophage cell therapy RTX001 for end-stage liver disease, just raised $85 million in Series B funding.
→ UK-based Curve Therapeutics has rolled out the welcome mat for two new faces: chairman Andre Hoekema and business development head Cora Griffin. Hoekema, the former CBO of Galapagos, had a career spanning 18 years with the company. Hoekema also serves on the advisory boards of Artax Biopharma, Fibrocor Therapeutics and Mimetas. Meanwhile, Griffin joins the team from Pfizer, where she served as anti-infectives strategy lead. Before that, she was with ReViral as head of BD, helping the team close its $525 million exit to Pfizer.
→ Ex-Pfizer Oncology president Garry Nicholson has punched his ticket to the board of directors at Athena Countouriotis’ latest bet, Avenzo Therapeutics. Nicholson was a board member at Turning Point Therapeutics, which Countouriotis sold to Bristol Myers in 2022, and he’s the chairman of Day One Biopharmaceuticals and Abdera Therapeutics.
→ Lonza has nominated the ex-CFO of Moderna and Amgen, David Meline, to the board of directors. Olivier Verscheure won’t seek reelection on the board at the Swiss CDMO, which is now under the leadership of Siegfried vet Wolfgang Wienand.