Maha Radhakrishnan, who left her post as chief medical officer at Biogen earlier this year, is now an executive partner at Sofinnova Investments, the firm exclusively told Endpoints News.
Radhakrishnan joined last week. Her arrival follows a steady stream of major bets by the investor this year, including cardiometabolic drug developer Marea, neuroscience company Seaport, oncology startup Avenzo, in vivo CAR-T player Capstan, and anti-aging and obesity company BioAge.
“I have always been intrigued by what is on the other side of private equity and investment, so I would say maybe eight, nine months ago I started thinking about what would happen if I were to make a transition,” Radhakrishnan said in an interview.
She spent about a decade at Biogen over two stints, with a multi-year hiatus to serve in roles at Bioverativ and Sanofi. In her most recent post at Biogen, she was medical chief during the Aduhelm saga and subsequent approval of another Alzheimer’s medicine known as Leqembi. She departed as the storied Boston drugmaker reshaped its pipeline, digested its biggest acquisition in years and pruned its workforce under a new CEO.
“I was really happy in my role at Biogen, absolutely loved the contributions I made, my teams made, to really move the company pipeline along and the commercialization of products,” Radhakrishnan said. “But there comes a point in your life where you feel like you can add a lot more, you could get much more fulfillment and learn more.”
Menlo Park, CA-based Sofinnova was founded in 1976 and manages about $3.7 billion in assets, as of mid-year. Radhakrishnan will assess programs and evaluate assets, help companies develop their clinical and regulatory plans, guide them as they build out their leadership teams and other functions. She highlighted the importance of engaging with regulators, patient advocacy groups and payers early on.
Drug development is “an art” that can be a lot of fun, she said, but it’s “not for the faint of heart.”