Peter FlynnPeter Flynn has taken the helm from Avalon BioVentures managing partner Jay Lichter at Arialys Therapeutics, a startup that is developing treatments in the field of immunoneuropsychiatry — a winding term that describes an emerging area of research around how immune reactions impact the brain.
Flynn previously co-founded and served as chief operating officer of Artiva Biotherapeutics, an NK cell therapy company that had partnerships with Merck and Affimed. Prior to Artiva, he was an executive at Orexigen, a San Diego company that marketed the weight loss drug Contrave before it went out of business.
While Flynn left his chief operating officer role at Artiva last year, he still serves as an advisor to the company.
“The more that I learned, the more intrigued I got, and hopefully that is going to be the case for everybody,” Flynn said of Arialys.
The company, which raised a $58 million seed round, is developing a treatment for anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis (ANRE), a rare but serious form of autoimmune brain inflammation.
How self-attacking antibodies can wreak havoc in the brain is an up-and-coming area of study, as researchers previously believed that the brain was spared from such autoimmune reactions. And now a growing body of research suggests that autoimmune reactions may be implicated in a percentage of psychosis and dementia cases as well, Flynn said.
Arialys’ experimental treatment isn’t an immunosuppressive agent, which would tamp down the body’s immune reactions broadly. Rather, it’s an antibody that would block self-attacking antibodies from binding the NDMA receptor.
“That’s important because a lot of the patients that we’ll be treating are young patients, and are otherwise healthy. Do you want to immunosuppress those patients?” Flynn said.
The company plans to begin human trials starting with healthy volunteers later this year before moving to studies in patients next year, Flynn said.
— Lei Lei Wu
Edward Dulac→ Edward Dulac will take over for Glenn Goddard as CFO of Intellia Therapeutics on July 22. Dulac resigned from Fate Therapeutics on June 14 following a nearly four-year tenure as CFO, and he rose through the ranks at Celgene from 2013-20, eventually taking on the role of VP, business development & strategy. This week Intellia gave a look at how gene therapies can possibly be readministered in a three-person study of patients with transthyretin amyloidosis. “Our goal would always be to do it one-and-done. But if two or three infusions is what it takes to get there, then a lipid nanoparticle is probably going to be a good way to accomplish that,” CEO John Leonard told Endpoints News.
Andrew Saik→ Peer Review wouldn’t be the same this year without Arvinas, which has selected Andrew Saik as CFO. Saik had been CFO of Intercept from 2021-23 and is the ex-finance chief at Vyne Therapeutics and PDS Biotechnology. His predecessor, Sean Cassidy, left the protein degradation biotech on Feb. 29. Arvinas has retooled its team beyond Saik, promoting Ian Taylor to head of R&D and Angela Cacace to CSO last week, moving Randy Teel to the CBO slot, hiring former Bristol Myers Squibb hematology exec Noah Berkowitz as CMO, and bringing in Saik’s Intercept colleague Jared Freedberg as general counsel.
Erik Ostrowski→ Erik Ostrowski has landed at Akebia Therapeutics as CFO and CBO after Avrobio officially merged with Tectonic Therapeutic. Ostrowski had a four-and-a-half-year stint as CFO of Summit Therapeutics before taking the same job at Avrobio, and he replaced Geoff McKay as interim CEO of the gene therapy biotech in May 2023. (According to his LinkedIn page, McKay is the current CEO of Fable Therapeutics, a company in the Versant portfolio that’s still in stealth mode.) Once rejected because of safety concerns, vadadustat’s path to redemption ended in an FDA approval for patients with anemia due to chronic kidney disease in late March. Akebia’s drug is branded as Vafseo.
Joshua Brumm→ Dutch VC Forbion is putting down roots in Boston, naming ex-Dyne Therapeutics CEO Joshua Brumm as a general partner at the new office. “We are thrilled to have him on board to support our portfolio companies and help us seek out new investment opportunities in the US and beyond,” Forbion managing partner Martien van Osch said in a statement. “Opening an office in Boston is a natural next step for Forbion, supporting our existing portfolio in both Europe and North America.” Brumm announced his departure from Dyne in late March and was replaced by former Bioverativ chief John Cox.
Lis Leiderman→ Lis Leiderman has joined the biomolecular condensate specialists at Dewpoint Therapeutics as chief financial and corporate development officer. She was CFO and head of corporate development at Decibel Therapeutics before a brief stop as CFO and CBO for Atsena Therapeutics. Leiderman is also a board member at bluebird bio and Autolus. Merck and Pfizer both gave up on partnerships with Dewpoint, which is planning to file INDs for its beta-catenin and ALS programs in 2025.
Lori Englebert→ Lori Englebert’s first day as chief commercial officer at psychedelic drug developer Compass Pathways will be July 8. Englebert is an 11-year Amgen vet who was head of product strategy for Axsome Therapeutics, the maker of the major depressive disorder med Auvelity. London-based Compass is in a Phase 2 study of its psilocybin treatment COMP360 for patients with PTSD, and also appointed ex-Neumora CMO Michael Gold as chief R&D officer last month to guide its development.
Adam Thomas→ Roche’s precision oncology partner MOMA Therapeutics has recruited Marc Ballas as head of clinical development and Adam Thomas as chief people & experience officer. Ballas held clinical roles with Bristol Myers, AstraZeneca and GSK before pivoting to Novocure, where he was global head of clinical development & operations. Thomas is the first Synlogic vet to be featured in Peer Review this week, jumping to the now-shuttered biotech in 2017 from Shire. He would be elevated to chief people officer at Synlogic after starting out as human resources chief.
Brendan St. Amant→ The next Synlogic alum to find a new home is former Vertex senior counsel Brendan St. Amant, who has been named general counsel at Seismic Therapeutic. Synlogic hired St. Amant as head of legal in 2021 and became general counsel less than a year later. Led by Pandion co-founder Jo Viney and using its machine learning platform to boost immunology drug development, Seismic pulled together a $121 million Series B last December.
Gerardo Ubaghs→ Frontier Medicines, which tacked on another $20 million to its $80 million Series C that Kyle LaHucik told you about in February, has tapped Gerardo Ubaghs as CFO. Ubaghs is a classically trained violinist who left the music world behind for a career in investment banking as managing director in the global healthcare group for Bank of America. (By the way, Ubaghs tells Peer Review that he lists the Brahms violin concerto and the Beethoven Triple Concerto as his favorites.)
Ryan Robinson→ New York-based Tourmaline Bio has promoted Ryan Robinson to CFO. Robinson originally joined Tourmaline last summer as VP, finance and controller, and he was bumped up to VP of finance during his three years at Korro Bio. Tourmaline is projecting readouts in 2025 for its IL-6 inhibitor TOUR006 in both thyroid eye disease and atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease.
→ Backed by RA Capital and Wellington Management, MBX Biosciences has appointed Sam Azoulay as medical chief. Azoulay comes to the Indiana-based endocrine and metabolic disorder biotech after CMO gigs at Roivant and Sumitovant Biopharma. He also closed out his 19-year tenure at Pfizer with a promotion to CMO of Pfizer Essential Health.
Phil Tsai→ Phil Tsai has reunited with Clay Siegall as chief technical officer of cancer biotech Immunome. Tsai spent more than two decades at Seagen, culminating in his role as SVP of technical development. He replaces Phil Roberts, the ex-Mirati technical operations chief who had only been with Immunome for a few months.
Gianfranco Pittari→ Testing its lead asset MaaT013 in patients with acute graft-versus-host disease, French biotech MaaT Pharma has welcomed Gianfranco Pittari as CMO. After working on the CAR-T therapy Abecma at Celgene and Bristol Myers, Pittari had a two-year run with Autolus as its executive medical director.
→ Staying in France, hearing loss drugmaker Sensorion has enlisted Laurene Danon as CFO. This is Danon’s first industry position after 13 years with JP Morgan’s team in London and another three years with Jefferies.
Mary Janatpour→ Actym Therapeutics has named Mary Janatpour as CSO and Shouryadeep “Deep” Srivastava as SVP of clinical development. Janatpour served in the same role at Spotlight Therapeutics and also brings experience from Dynavax Technologies. Meanwhile, Srivastava joins the team from Theseus Pharmaceuticals, where he served as VP of clinical development. Earlier in his career, Srivastava served in roles at Jaguar Gene Therapy, iTeos Therapeutics and Takeda. Last October, Actym brought in another $25.5 million in a Series A extension led by Boehringer Ingelheim Venture Fund and Illumina Ventures.
Kim Moller→ MiMedx has promoted Kim Moller to chief commercial officer. Moller joined the team in August 2020 as SVP, sales. Prior to MiMedx, Moller was VP of sales at 3M and spent 16 years at Acelity, culminating in her role as SVP of sales.
→ Paul Varki has moved on to Avalo Therapeutics as chief legal officer. He just spent the last four years as US general counsel for Idorsia and was head of legal at Amarin. Earlier, Varki held multiple positions over a 12-year period at GSK, including assistant general counsel for global R&D.
Nadia Agopyan→ San Francisco-based Neurona Therapeutics has made a speedy return to Peer Review with Nadia Agopyan as SVP of regulatory affairs. Agopyan had the same job title at Marker Therapeutics and was in charge of regulatory affairs for the Yescarta franchise at Kite. Earlier this month, Neurona appointed Atara Biotherapeutics vet Manher Joshi as its new CMO.
→ Chronic skin disease startup Oruka Therapeutics is bringing on a trio of new names to its team: Paul Quinlan as general counsel & secretary (former general counsel of CymaBay Therapeutics), Alan Lada as VP of investor relations (former VP of equity capital markets at Guggenheim Partners), and Antiva Biosciences president and CEO Kristine Ball to its board of directors.
Amirali Kia→ Element Biosciences, which last year reported 100 commercial orders of its benchtop DNA sequencer, has rolled out the welcome mat for Amirali Kia as VP of artificial intelligence and Tina Tian as VP of portfolio management. Kia joins the San Diego-based team from Deepcell (VP of AI and data science) and Harbinger Health (VP of AI and computational biology). Meanwhile, Tian hops aboard with experience from Roche Diagnostics (head of pharma services), Thermo Fisher Scientific, Pacific Biosciences and Affymetrix.
John Maraganore→ Time for more John Maraganore appointments: The former Alnylam CEO is at it again in Peer Review, becoming a strategic advisor for Tevard Biosciences and Cybrexa Therapeutics. Maraganore has a mountain of advisory positions at companies like Legend Biotech, Overland Pharmaceuticals, ProQR, Abata Therapeutics, Chroma Medicine and many others.
Tim Walbert→ Ex-Horizon CEO Tim Walbert has nabbed a spot on the board of directors at COUR Pharmaceuticals, the Chicagoland autoimmune and inflammatory disease biotech that raised $105 million in January. Walbert is a board member at Mirum Pharmaceuticals and, more recently, Sagimet Biosciences. He’s also chaired the board at Century Therapeutics for the last 14 years.
→ Two former Seagen execs — ex-CEO David Epstein and ex-CFO Todd Simpson — are now on the board of directors at another Seattle company, RNA editing player Shape Therapeutics. Last September, Otsuka and Shape teamed up on an eye disease gene therapy pact that could be worth more than $1.5 billion.
Sarah Boyce→ Avidity Biosciences chief Sarah Boyce is the latest addition to the board of directors at Contineum Therapeutics after the appointment of Rapport Therapeutics CFO Troy Ignelzi last month. Like Rapport, Contineum is a new neuro-focused entry on the Nasdaq, debuting in April with a $110 million IPO.
→ Flagship’s Omega Therapeutics has elected Richard Kender to the board of directors. Kender, who had a 35-year career at Merck before retiring in 2013, also has board seats at Seres Therapeutics, Bicycle Therapeutics, Longeveron and Poxel.
→ Jan Malcolm has replaced Katherine Klein on the board of directors at Tyvaso maker United Therapeutics. Malcolm served as health commissioner for the state of Minnesota on two separate occasions.