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 Max Bayer or Gabrielle Masson, and we will feature it here at the end of each week.
After more than five years, J&J R&D head Mammen departs
Johnson & Johnson
In a surprising move, J&J’s head of R&D Mathai Mammen, M.D., Ph.D., is headed for the exits, calling it quits at the world’s largest pharma after more than five years in the role to chase “other opportunities.” Mammen joined in June 2017 after an extended stint at Merck leading R&D in a number of disease areas. His latest departure was somewhat unexpected, with J&J announcing the move after market close Aug. 8.
Mammen got his start co-founding Theravence in 1996, leading R&D for the biotech which centered on building small molecules. On his LinkedIn page, Mammen touts having worked on 31 developmental candidates over 17 years, with 16 clinical-stage assets and five approved meds.
Johnson and Johnson did not elaborate on why he was departing in the 106-word statement but says William Hait, M.D., Ph.D., will be leading the department on an interim basis while a permanent replacement is sought out. Fierce Biotech
Cancer surgeon Bertagnolli slated to become first woman to lead National Cancer Institute
National Cancer Institute
President Joe Biden made a momentous appointment Wednesday, announcing Monica Bertagnolli, M.D., as his pick to lead the National Cancer Institute (NCI), the first woman to ever hold the role. The move comes four months after Ned Sharpless, M.D., stepped down from the role after more than four years.
The move has added importance in light of the president’s Cancer Moonshot Initiative, which aims to cut the cancer death rate in half over the next 25 years. Under the National Institutes of Health, the NCI is tasked with overseeing much of federal research that could chip away at that goal.
In terms of cancer surgery, Bertagnolli has as tip-top a resume as you can find. She’s the Richard E. Wilson professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School, focused on cancer surgery, and is a practicing surgeon at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. She’s also a member of the Gastrointestinal Cancer and Sarcoma Disease Centers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, where she also served as chief of the surgical oncology division for 11 years until 2018. Additionally, Bertagnolli is the former president and chair of the American Society of Clinical Oncology. Release
Lilly brings aboard BMS hematology SVP as new chief commercial officer
Lilly
With Lilly’s HR chief on his way out, a replacement domino effect has led to the hiring of a new chief commercial officer for Lilly’s oncology arm, Loxo@Lilly. The company announced that Winselow Tucker, SVP and general manager of U.S. hematology at Bristol Myers Squibb will be joining as COO of the cancer wing. The move comes after Lilly’s SVP of human resources and diversity, Stephen Fry, announced plans to retire by the end of the year. He’s replaced by Loxo@Lilly’s current COO, Eric Dozier.
Winselow joined BMS in 2019 after the company’s acquisition of Celgene, where he was in the same role, leading both hematology and oncology. It was actually his second time at the company, after a brief nine-month stint in 2013-14 as VP of global commercialization, immuno-oncology strategy and early oncology development. Winselow has also served as general manager of oncology for Novartis’ Canada division.
In 2019, Lilly bought Loxo Oncology for $8 billion and retained the branding as it melded the the two companies. It’s since become home base for Lilly’s cancer work, which includes FDA-approved drugs lung and thyroid cancer med Retevmo and head, neck and colorectal cancer treatment Erbitux, among others. Release
> PsiOxus has found its new leader, naming Howard Davis, Ph.D., as CEO. Davis was most recently chief operating officer of Third Harmonic Bio and is also a former principal at Flagship Pioneering. Release
> Prellis Biologics taps former Generate CSO Michael Nohaile, Ph.D., as its new CEO as it looks to build off a fresh round of fundraising. In addition to the leadership announcement, the company says it raised $35 million in a series C round. Release
> Regenerative medicine advocacy organization The Alliance for Regenerative Medicine has found a new leader, naming Timothy Hunt as CEO. Hunt most recently served as chief culture and corporate affairs officer at Xilio Therapeutics. Release
> Clinical-stage biotech Peptilogics has expanded its leadership by two, with Atul Deshpande, Ph.D., appointed to be chief strategy officer and Nicholas Pachuda promoted to chief operating officer. Deshpande previously served as the CEO of Immediate Therapeutics and has held past leadership roles at Harbour BioMed and Sanofi. Pachuda previously served as SVP of portfolio and development at Peptilogics, joining the company in 2020 from pharma giant Johnson & Johnson. Release
> Effector Therapeutics has tapped Douglas Warner, M.D., as chief medical officer. Warner, who held roles of increasing responsibility over 18 years at Amgen, is filling the role vacated in April by Premal Patel, M.D., Ph.D., who resigned to pursue a new career opportunity. Release
> Seattle-based Nautilus Biotechnology is bringing on Eric Spence to be the company’s VP of instrument engineering and Ken Kuhn, Ph.D., as VP of reagent and platform development. Spence comes from Genapsys, where he most recently held the role of senior director, while Kuhn joins after a combined 20 years at sequencing companies Encodia and Illumina. Release
> Lorenz Mayr, Ph.D., will take the reins as CEO of newly launched Vector Biopharma. Mayr has executive leadership experience from his time at Bayer, Novartis, AstraZeneca and GE Healthcare. Vector has also tapped Nicholas Barbet, Ph.D., to lead as head of operations. Barbet joins from Corlieve Therapeutics, and, before that, held roles of increasing responsibility at Roche. Release
> Appia Bio has appointed Jason Damiano, Ph.D., to be its chief scientific officer. Damiano joins the preclinical biotech from his role as VP of biology at Unity Biotechnology. The biotech has also added Margo Roberts, Ph.D., former CSO of Kite Pharma—which was acquired by Gilead in 2017—to its board of directors. Release
> Curebase has named Alan Sun as its vice president of product. Before Curebase, Sun was VP of product at Apixio, a healthcare AI analytics platform provider. He also has leadership experience at Syapse, Lyra Health and Epocrates. Release
> Scribe Therapeutics is writing down a trio of new senior appointments in pen, clear evidence of the company’s expansion as it also grows out its Bay Area headquarters. The company announced it was naming Sunny Mok, Ph.D., as VP of program management, Shilpa Shroff, Ph.D., as VP of process sciences and Vera Switek as VP of talent. Release
> AstraZeneca vet Caroline Germa is set to be the new executive vice president of global medicine development and chief medical officer of Transcenta. She was most recently the VP and head of early development for oncology at AstraZeneca. Release
> Gemini Therapeutics and Disc Medicine are merging, hoping the combined company will find success in future horoscopes. The new company will be led by Disc’s executive management, including John Quisel, Ph.D., current president and CEO of Disc. Release
> Another Nektar Therapeutics alum is back on their feet, as former chief medical officer Dimitry Nuyten, M.D., Ph.D., has been tapped for the same role at Arcus Biosciences. Nuyten had departed from Nektar as part of the company’s downsizing following persistent trial failures of its lead asset, bempegaldesleukin. Release
> Scott Rottinghaus, M.D., former clinical development leader at AstraZeneca’s rare disease subsidiary Alexion, is joining Enanta as chief medical officer. He’ll be overseeing clinical development of Enanta’s small molecules to treat viral infections and liver diseases. Release