Chutes & Ladders—After Verastem pit stop, bluebird vet Neumann lands at Kite

                Chutes and Ladders
Welcome to this week's Chutes & Ladders, our roundup of hirings, firings and retirings throughout the industry. Please send the good word—or the bad—from your shop to Fraiser Kansteiner, and we will feature it here at the end of each week.


After nabbing new CEO, Penrose TherapeuTx hires Pfizer, Astellas veteran chief development officer

Penrose TherapeuTx
Bhardwaj Desai, M.D., joins the fold as chief development officer.

Desai signs on equipped with 30 years experience as a hematologist and oncologist—the last sixteen of which were spent as a leader in oncology drug development for pharma juggernauts like Astellas, Pfizer, Hospira and Abbot/AbbVie. On the Penrose team, Desai will be “instrumental in guiding the clinical development efforts, specifically the development of the company’s novel MMA platform and lead candidate, RP-0320,” the company said in a release. Penrose’s platform leverages Mitochondrial Modifying Agents, which create a selective mitochondrial vulnerability that “ultimately lead to cancer cell metabolic collapse.” With its preclinical RP-0320, Penrose is targeting a range of cancers, including late-stage cancers of the colon, lung, breast and pancreas—plus some blood cancers and rare cancers, too. Fierce Biotech


Gilead's Kite unit snags ex-bluebird cancer research head after a stopover at Verastem

Kite Pharma
Frank Neumann, M.D., Ph.D., signs on as global head of clinical development.

Neumann is on deck to lead clinical development in blood cancers and solid tumors at Gilead Science’s Kite Pharma, where he’s signing on after a brief stint at Verastem Oncology. He’ll take the reins from Ken Takeshita, M.D., who’s hitting the exit at the end of February to “pursue another opportunity,” Kite said in a statement. Neumann joined Verastem in early January to manage the clinical development and regulatory strategy of treatments targeting cancer-driving genes, but the company announced his departure two weeks later, citing Neumann’s desire to work on a different kind of cancer treatment. Prior to his Verastem stopover, Neumann was head of oncology clinical development at bluebird. He held various roles at Takeda before that. Fierce Biotech


Ex-Biogen chief and Editas chair Mullen becomes CRISPR biotech's new CEO amid C-suite shake-up

Editas Medicine 
James Mullen takes over as CEO from Feb. 15.

Editas chairman Mullen will don the CEO mantle Feb. 15, taking over for current Editas chief Cynthia Collins. Before jumping to the Editas team, Mullen was CEO and director of the CDMO Patheon—later snapped up by Thermo Fisher—and also served as the CEO of Biogen. In a brief release, Editas didn’t say why Collins was leaving. “It has been a privilege to lead Editas Medicine and this extremely talented team,” she said in a statement. “I am particularly proud of the progress to the clinic we have made with both in vivo and ex vivo gene edited medicines.” Collins joined Editas in 2019, picking up the role from Katrine Bosley, who left just after the company’s first asset was given the go-ahead to start trials. Prior to that, Collins was CEO at Human Longevity. Fierce Biotech


> Flagship Pioneering has named Diego Miralles, M.D., as CEO-partner. Miralles will serve as chief executive of Flagship’s portfolio company Laronde. The company also hired Rubius Therapeutics vet Andrew Oh as senior partner. Miralles joins after three years as CEO of Vividion Therapeutics, where he supervised the raising of an $82 million series B round and a deal with Roche worth $135 million upfront. Meanwhile, Oh spent three years as chief financial officer of Flagship’s Rubius before joining the VC company in late 2020. Fierce Biotech

> Eli Lilly tapped Anat Ashkenazi, formerly senior vice president, controller and chief financial officer of Lilly Research Laboratories, to take over as chief financial officer from Josh Smiley. Smiley, who’s served as CFO since early 2018, is leaving the company—and forfeiting $24 million in cash and equity awards—after Lilly hired an external firm to investigate allegations of an inappropriate relationship between Smiley and an employee. Fierce Pharma

> Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Werewolf Therapeutics has tapped Tim Trost as chief financial officer. Trost joins the pack from Asklepios BioPharmaceutical, where he was CFO until Bayer snapped up the company in October 2020. Before his stint at AskBio, Trost was senior vice president and CFO of Chimerix, a biopharma focused on the development of oncology and biodefense treatments. Release

> JCyte’s board of directors has promoted Shannon Blalock to CEO and an elected member of the board. The move comes after Blalock joined jCyte as chief operating officer last year. Prior to that, Blalock was the global leader for portfolio development and global R&D strategy at Santen Pharmaceuticals. Before that, he co-founded and served as chief commercial officer of AltheaDx after working at GlaxoSmithKline for more than a decade. Release

> Life Biosciences, which aims to regulate the biology of aging, has enlisted Joan Mannick, M.D., as head of research and development. She comes on board from Adicet Bio, formerly known as resTORbio, where she was co-founder and chief medical officer, and also led R&D efforts. Before that, she was executive director of the new indications discovery unit at Novartis Institutes of Biomedical Research, where she ran its clinical-stage program targeting aging biology as a new way to treat aging-related conditions. Release

> Clinical-stage biotech Frequency Therapeutics has signed on Kevin Franck, Ph.D., as senior vice president of strategic marketing and new product planning. Franck will oversee pre-commercial strategy and launch planning for the company’s clinical pipeline, including its lead program aimed at developing a restorative treatment for sensorineural hearing loss. Franck—a licensed audiologist—comes over from Massachusetts Eye and Ear and previously served as head of marketing for Bose’s Bose Hear unit. Release

> Muscle disease company Dyne Therapeutics tapped Ashish Dugar, Ph.D., as senior vice president, global head of medical affairs. Formerly the vice president and global head of medical affairs at Sarepta Therapeutics, Dugar also spent 13 years at Pfizer, where he most recently served as VP and global head of clinical development and medical affairs of the company’s biosimilars unit. Release

> Stamford, Connecticut-based health intelligence company Sema4 has named Isaac Ro as chief financial officer, responsible for overseeing all aspects of financial strategy, management and planning. Ro joins from Thrive Earlier Detection, where he also held the CFO role and led the company’s $2.15 billion sale to Exact Sciences. Release

> Raleigh, North Carolina’s BioDelivery Sciences International (BDSI) has promoted Chief Financial Officer Terry Coelho to executive vice president and chief financial officer. Coelho signed on with BDSI in January 2019 and, through her CFO work, the company has “achieved profitability and strengthened its balance sheet,” BDSI said in a statement. Before joining BDSI, Coelho held various senior finance and general management roles at companies like Balchem, Diversey, Novartis and Mars. Release

> Vancouver-based biotherapeutics firm Zymeworks has promoted James Priour, formerly senior vice president, commercial, to chief commercial officer. Priour has also been named to the company’s executive committee. Zymeworks has also hired on Manny Duenas as vice president, global value and access. Plus, former head of discovery research John Babcook will shift into the newly minted role of distinguished fellow, passing discovery research leadership to SVP of research Guowei Fang, Ph.D. Release

> Clinical-stage immuno-oncology company Surface Oncology has named chief medical officer Robert Ross, M.D., as president and chief executive officer. Ross will succeed current chief Jeff Goater, who’ll pick up the baton as chairman of the company’s board of directors. Current chairman Daniel Lynch will switch into a senior advisory role, while director Geoffrey McDonough, M.D., is hopping into the new role of lead independent director of the board. The shake-up is effective April 1. Release 

> Biomolecular condensates firm Dewpoint Therapeutics tapped Joel Sendek as chief financial officer and treasurer. Before coming on board, Sendek was chief financial officer at Sema4, where he helped the company raise a $121 million series C. Prior to that, he held the same role at Spero Therapeutics and Forward Pharma, guiding each company through an initial public offering. Release

> CDMO Recro Pharma announced the appointment of Ryan Lake as chief financial officer late last year. The company also signed on new CEO David Enloe around that same time. Lake joined Recro in 2017 as senior vice president of finance and chief accounting officer. Prior to that, he was CFO and vice president of finance at commercial-stage medical device company Aspire Bariatrics. Recro has also tapped CDMO industry thought leader James Miller to its board of directors. Release

> Gemini Therapeutics, a precision medicine company working on treatments for genetically defined age-related macular degeneration, has enlisted Brian Piekos as chief financial officer. Piekos joins from AMAG Pharmaceuticals, where he most recently served as EVP, chief financial officer and treasurer. Release

> New York City-based biotech IN8bio has tapped Patrick McCall as chief financial officer. He comes over from Turnstone Biologics, where he was vice president of finance. Prior to that, McCall was the senior director of finance and corporate controller for Catalyst Biosciences. Release

> San Francisco immuno-oncology company Lyell Immunopharma named Charlie Newton as chief financial officer. Newton previously co-headed BofA Securities’ healthcare investment banking practice in the Americas, where he advised biotech companies on M&A and financings. Before his time at Bank of America, he held the same role at Credit Suisse and headed Morgan Stanley’s western region healthcare investment banking practice. Release

> Elicio Therapeutics, developing immunotherapies that leverage its proprietary lymph node targeting technology, has named Annette Matthies, Ph.D., as chief business officer. Matthies played a key role in the initial public offering for Receptos, later picked up by Celgene for $7.2 billion, and also worked at Abbott Laboratories after its $450 million buyout of Facet Biotech, where she served in a post-acquisition integration position. Release