→ En­trenched in a le­gal bat­tle with their man­u­fac­tur­er that’s ev­i­dent­ly block­ing them from mak­ing their Covid-19 vac­cine can­di­date, In­ovio is mak­ing some lead­er­ship changes. Gene Kim will be pres­i­dent of In­ovio Asia, while Mam­men (An­za) Mam­men jumps aboard the biotech as SVP, clin­i­cal de­vel­op­ment, and is slat­ed over­see de­vel­op­ment of In­ovio’s DNA vac­cine can­di­date INO-4800.

An ex-CFO at VGX Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals, Kim had pre­vi­ous­ly been the CFO of AfreecaTV and video game de­vel­op­er We­Made En­ter­tain­ment, both South Ko­re­an com­pa­nies. And Mam­men, who re­tired from the US Army with the rank of colonel, spent more than 6 years at Vi­cal, be­com­ing their SVP, clin­i­cal de­vel­op­ment, and pri­or to that role, was an in­fec­tious dis­ease con­sul­tant and found­ing chief of the DoD’s pan­dem­ic warn­ing team at Fort De­t­rick, MD.

→ Start­ing Ju­ly 13, Far­go, ND-based plas­mid DNA man­u­fac­tur­er Alde­vron will change CEOs. Kevin Ballinger, who was “on the verge of be­ing a lif­er” at Boston Sci­en­tif­ic, will take the helm. He’s re­plac­ing Michael Cham­bers, who was named ex­ec­u­tive chair­man of the board at Alde­vron, which was found­ed on the cam­pus of North Dako­ta State Uni­ver­si­ty in 1998 by Cham­bers and John Bal­lan­tyne. Ballinger was EVP and glob­al pres­i­dent of Boston Sci­en­tif­ic’s largest di­vi­sion, in­ter­ven­tion­al car­di­ol­o­gy, for the past 9 years.

Ja­son Fontenot

→ An R&D split is un­fold­ing at Sang­amo, where EVP of R&D Adri­an Woolf­son, who had on­ly been with the Cal­i­for­nia biotech since Jan­u­ary 2019, has been shown the door. With a search un­der­way for a new head of de­vel­op­ment, Bio­gen vet Ja­son Fontenot — who has been Sang­amo’s SVP of cell ther­a­py — steps up to the plate as in­ter­im head of re­search. Be­fore join­ing Sang­amo, Fontenot was CSO at Im­mu­soft Cor­po­ra­tion and, pri­or to that, found­ed Im­mune Au­toma­ta Con­sult­ing. He spent 8 years at Bio­gen, where he was a group leader in im­munol­o­gy dis­cov­ery.

→ Men­tal health and psy­che­delics biotech ATAI Life Sci­ences has launched In­tro­Spect Dig­i­tal Ther­a­peu­tics, nam­ing David Keene pres­i­dent and CEO of the new plat­form. ”By us­ing a va­ri­ety of dig­i­tal bio­mark­ers, we stand to make treat­ments in­creas­ing­ly re­fined, ef­fec­tive, and — most im­por­tant­ly for men­tal health­care — in­di­vid­u­al­ized,” Keene said in a state­ment. Keene found­ed Everys­to­ry, which was lat­er re­named Dthera Sci­ences in 2016, and was their chief tech­nol­o­gy of­fi­cer, lead­ing de­vel­op­ment of what has been de­scribed as an AI-en­abled de­vice for Alzheimer’s dubbed DTHR-ALZ.

Robert Radie

→ Neu­rap­tive Ther­a­peu­tics — fo­cused on the treat­ment of pe­riph­er­al nerve in­juries — has brought on Robert Radie to take over the helm of the com­pa­ny as CEO and chair­man of the board. Radie has ex­pe­ri­ence run­ning op­er­a­tions as CEO at Zy­la Life Sci­ences, Trans­mol­e­c­u­lar and Topaz Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals (ac­quired by Sanofi Pas­teur). In ad­di­tion, he’s held posts at Prest­wick Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals, Mor­photek and Vi­curon Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals.

Samuel Tong

→ The Lab­o­ra­to­ry for Ad­vanced Med­i­cine has wooed Samuel Tong as CEO of the com­pa­ny’s Chi­nese op­er­a­tions. Tong hops aboard from NAM­SA, where he served as VP and gen­er­al man­ag­er of the Asia Pa­cif­ic Re­gion. Pre­vi­ous­ly, he served in roles at QI­A­GEN, Ab­bott Vas­cu­lar and GE Med­ical among oth­ers.

→ Ef­fec­tive Ju­ly 30, Nicholas Green is suc­ceed­ing Rick Han­cock as pres­i­dent and CEO of Cal­i­for­nia-based CD­MO Avid Bioser­vices. Han­cock had been in­ter­im pres­i­dent and CEO for the past year. Green jumps to Avid af­ter 9 years as pres­i­dent and CEO of Ther­a­pure Bio­phar­ma, a com­pa­ny out of Mis­sis­sauga, On­tario that al­so in­cludes Ther­a­pure Man­u­fac­tur­ing. He was al­so pres­i­dent and CEO of Rho­dia Phar­ma So­lu­tions and was briefly the pres­i­dent of the phar­ma di­vi­sion at Codex­is.

Allen Melemed

→ Eli Lil­ly vet Allen Melemed has been named CMO of Chimerix, which six years ago found it­self at the cen­ter of a hur­ri­cane of pub­lic anger over its ini­tial re­fusal to pro­vide their lead ex­per­i­men­tal drug to a dy­ing child. Be­fore his move to the Durham, NC-based biotech, Melemed was a Dis­tin­guished Med­ical Fel­low and se­nior di­rec­tor of reg­u­la­to­ry af­fairs on­col­o­gy, North Amer­i­ca at Lil­ly. Among the on­col­o­gy med­i­cines he worked on in his 20-plus years at the phar­ma gi­ant is Verzenio, which just last week showed pos­i­tive re­sults in a Phase III tri­al for pa­tients with high risk hor­mone re­cep­tor/HER2 neg­a­tive breast can­cer.

→ An­oth­er Eli Lil­ly vet, Thane Wet­tig, is head­ed to San Fran­cis­co bio­phar­ma Fi­bro­Gen as their chief com­mer­cial of­fi­cer. Pri­or to Fi­bro­Gen, which just had its lead drug rox­idu­s­tat for ane­mia ac­cept­ed for re­view by the EMA, Wet­tig had been the chief com­mer­cial of­fi­cer and meta­bol­ic fran­chise leader at Intar­cia Ther­a­peu­tics. Be­fore then, Wet­tig was at Lil­ly for near­ly 28 years, leav­ing as VP of glob­al mar­ket­ing, strat­e­gy and al­liance man­age­ment for Lil­ly Di­a­betes.

Robert Jor­dan

→ Res­pi­ra­to­ry in­fec­tion-fo­cused Meis­sa Vac­cines has re­cruit­ed Robert Jor­dan as their VP of R&D af­ter a short tenure as Vir’s di­rec­tor of vi­rol­o­gy. Jor­dan al­so had a hand in the dis­cov­ery and de­vel­op­ment of an­tivi­ral ther­a­pies, most no­tably remde­sivir, when he was di­rec­tor of bi­ol­o­gy for Gilead. Be­fore his time at Gilead, he was di­rec­tor of vi­rol­o­gy at Siga Tech­nolo­gies.

→ Josefin-Beate Holz has been named CMO at RNA epi­ge­net­ics play­er Storm Ther­a­peu­tics. Holz makes her way to the Uni­ver­si­ty of Cam­bridge spin­out af­ter be­ing an in­de­pen­dent clin­i­cal ad­vi­sor since 2015. Her lead­er­ship ex­pe­ri­ence in­cludes tenures at Abl­ynx, GPC-Biotech, Gilead, Bris­tol My­ers Squibb, OSI Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals (ac­quired by Astel­las) and LEO Phar­ma.

→ Com­pass Path­ways, the Lon­don men­tal health start­up backed by Pe­ter Thiel which grabbed $80 mil­lion in fund­ing back in April, has wel­comed Trevor Mill as chief de­vel­op­ment of­fi­cer. Mill joins Com­pass af­ter be­ing SVP, head of glob­al safe­ty and reg­u­la­to­ry sci­ences with Bio­gen. He was al­so Pfiz­er’s head of reg­u­la­to­ry strat­e­gy, phar­mather­a­peu­tics, and spent 12 years over­all at the phar­ma gi­ant.

Ter­ri Young

→ With its SER-109 pro­gram in Phase III de­vel­op­ment for re­cur­rent C. diff, and try­ing to work its way back in­to the mix af­ter 30% of its work­force was let go in ear­ly 2019, mi­cro­bio­me play­er Seres Ther­a­peu­tics has named Ter­ri Young EVP, chief com­mer­cial and strat­e­gy of­fi­cer, ef­fec­tive June 29. Young is leav­ing Sage Ther­a­peu­tics, where she was VP glob­al com­mer­cial strat­e­gy. The GSK vet al­so spent time in lead­er­ship at Bris­tol My­ers Squibb as VP and gen­er­al Man­ag­er, car­dio­vas­cu­lar.

Reina Ben­abou

→ Just a week af­ter plug­ging in Will Kane as chief com­mer­cial of­fi­cer, New Haven, CT phar­ma BioX­cel Ther­a­peu­tics has brought in Reina Ben­abou as SVP and chief de­vel­op­ment of­fi­cer. Ben­abou, who joins BioX­cel af­ter be­ing SVP & CMO at Cog­nivue, has a Big Phar­ma back­ground that in­cludes stints at No­var­tis (VP & world­wide med­ical head for the neu­ro­science fran­chise) and Pfiz­er (head of glob­al med­ical prod­uct eval­u­a­tion).

→ There are pro­mo­tions ga­lore at Coral Gables, FL-based Cat­a­lyst Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals, the mak­er of Fir­dapse to treat adults with Lam­bert-Eaton myas­thenic syn­drome. Jef­frey Del Car­men gets the bump to chief com­mer­cial of­fi­cer af­ter ar­riv­ing at Cat­a­lyst in Au­gust 2018 as SVP of sales and mar­ket­ing. Del Car­men had pre­vi­ous­ly been VP of busi­ness de­vel­op­ment for Paragon Bio­sciences. Mean­while, Pe­te Cur­ry moves to VP of sales, and Maria Pan­dol­fo has been pro­mot­ed to VP of pa­tient ser­vices.

→ Af­ter re­cent­ly post­ing pos­i­tive in­ter­im da­ta for their Phase I tri­al, Cal­i­for­nia-based biotech Ad­verum Biotech­nolo­gies has added a new face to the team with the ap­point­ment of Heik­ki Jout­ti­järvi as VP, man­u­fac­tur­ing. Jout­ti­järvi hops aboard from Men­lo Ther­a­peu­tics, where he served as VP, tech­ni­cal op­er­a­tions. Pre­vi­ous­ly, Jout­ti­järvi served in roles at San­ten Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal Com­pa­ny.

→ Syg­na­ture Dis­cov­ery, a Not­ting­ham-based provider of drug dis­cov­ery and pre­clin­i­cal ser­vices, has made a new ad­di­tion to its lead­er­ship team with the ap­point­ment of Paul Over­ton as SVP of busi­ness de­vel­op­ment. Over­ton joins the com­pa­ny from Eu­rofins, where he served as head of Eu­ro­pean sales, mar­ket­ing and key ac­count man­age­ment.

Tere­sa Bair

→ Can­cer-fo­cused Buf­fa­lo, NY bio­phar­ma Athenex has pro­mot­ed Tere­sa Bair to gen­er­al coun­sel and SVP, ad­min­is­tra­tion from her pre­vi­ous po­si­tion of SVP, le­gal af­fairs and ad­min­is­tra­tion. Be­fore mak­ing it to Athenex in 2015, Bair was a part­ner at Har­ris Beach.

→ Over at a dif­fer­ent Cat­a­lyst, Charles De­mocko has moved to Cat­a­lyst Bio­sciences to be­come SVP, reg­u­la­to­ry af­fairs. De­mocko had led Cy­tomX’s reg­u­la­to­ry af­fairs and qual­i­ty, and be­fore that, he was VP of reg­u­la­to­ry af­fairs at an ar­ray of com­pa­nies such as As­cendis, Kalo­Bios, No­vacea, Phar­ma­co­Fore, and Con­net­ics.

→ Nascent Biotech out of San Diego has as­signed Nav­paul Singh to the role of chief med­ical con­sul­tant for Covid-19 re­search, par­tic­u­lar­ly as it per­tains to their lead prod­uct, Pri­tu­mum­ab. “This op­por­tu­ni­ty with Nascent Biotech al­lows me to con­tin­ue my med­ical work in vi­ral in­fec­tions that are with us to­day and pos­si­bly in the fu­ture,” Singh said in a state­ment.

→ Cana­di­an CRO Al­ta­sciences — which pre­vi­ous­ly inked a deal with fel­low CRO WuXi last May — has en­list­ed Joseph Fran­cis­co as chief tox­i­col­o­gist. Fran­cis­co joins with ex­pe­ri­ence from his time at Charles Riv­er Lab­o­ra­to­ries, Seat­tle Ge­net­ics and Bris­tol My­ers Squibb.

→ Part­ner­ing with Roche’s Genen­tech on an im­muno-on­col­o­gy col­lab­o­ra­tion, Bi­cy­cle Ther­a­peu­tics has ap­point­ed Sir Kei­th Pe­ters chair­man of their sci­en­tif­ic ad­vi­so­ry board. Pe­ters, the emer­i­tus regius pro­fes­sor of physic at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Cam­bridge, was al­so on the board of med­ical ad­vis­ers to Mer­ck Re­search Lab­o­ra­to­ries and se­nior con­sul­tant in R&D for GSK.

Jane Was­man

→ Nat­ur­al killer im­munother­a­py play­er Cy­tovia Ther­a­peu­tics has added Leila Al­land and Jane Was­man to their board of di­rec­tors. Al­land, the cur­rent CMO at PMV Phar­ma, was pre­vi­ous­ly the CEO at Af­fimed and has held po­si­tions at such Big Phar­mas as As­traZeneca, Bris­tol My­ers Squibb and No­var­tis. Was­man, the chair of the board at Sel­l­as Life Sci­ences, al­so spent 15 years at Acor­da Ther­a­peu­tics.