Exclusive: Former Genentech duo reunites to push Sonoma into the clinic; Ex-Magenta commercial chief heads to Editas

Joe Arron and Mark Eisner worked together for about a decade at Genentech, with broad remits but a shared passion for interstitial lung disease. They’d go their separate ways a few years ago — Arron to 23andMe as chief scientific officer of its therapeutics push and Eisner to FibroGen, where he led the medical operations.

Then, Regeneron-partnered Sonoma Biotherapeutics came calling. When the two got word they were both looking to join the cell therapy biotech, Arron and Eisner met at Philz Coffee in Burlingame, CA. For Arron, the meeting sealed the deal — he couldn’t pass up the role if that meant working with an enthusiastic Eisner again. Arron had already been on Sonoma’s scientific advisory board, and now it was time to swap roles with science chief and co-founder Fred Ramsdell, who is retiring.

Eisner and Arron moved into the chief medical and scientific posts, respectively, on Monday after taking a few weeks to decompress from their previous jobs.

Arron left behind a treasure trove of human genetics data at 23andMe, but the target discovery resources were more limited than he anticipated, and he felt it was the right time to start anew. “They just need to figure out how to build the right kind of collaborations with organizations that have the wherewithal to prosecute those things,” he told Endpoints News. Meanwhile, Eisner departed after a tough year for FibroGen, which went through a series of Phase III fails. “Sometimes the molecules don’t behave as you hope they will,” he said in a joint interview.

The pair will work with co-founder and CEO Jeff Bluestone to bring Sonoma’s regulatory T cell therapies into the clinic for autoimmune diseases as part of a push by a select group of biotechs attempting to expand cell therapy’s potential beyond oncology. Sonoma will begin with a study in rheumatoid arthritis, with the first patient slated for dosing by year’s end, Eisner said.

The biotech industry has been putting out fires in the inflammation and immunology field for decades. But the house still needs rebuilding, as Arron likes to analogize. He and Eisner said they’re encouraged Sonoma is not alone in moving cell therapy into autoimmune diseases. Sangamo Therapeutics, GentiBio, Quell Therapeutics and others are joining in and enlisting Big Pharma peers.

“So the potential of introducing a cell that can do a lot of different things, not just inhibit one inflammatory cytokine or one signaling pathway, but actually be present in the tissue and rightsize the inflammatory response and promote healing and tissue repair has been an aspiration for what I’ve been trying to do in my own research for years,” Arron said. — Kyle LaHucik

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→ Editas Medicine has made its third big hire in four months as Caren Deardorf takes on the new role of chief commercial and strategy officer. Deardorf worked on Spinraza and Tecfidera as a commercial leader at Biogen, and she had been chief commercial officer for Magenta Therapeutics until a mass exodus in February that included her, CEO Jason Gardner and three other C-suite execs. Layoffs also affected 84% of the staff after a patient died in a Phase I/II trial for Magenta’s antibody-drug conjugate MGTA-117. The biotech then merged with Dianthus Therapeutics, which debuted with a $100 million Series A exactly one year before the transaction was announced. The company that gave Deardorf her first job as commercial chief, Flagship’s Ohana Biosciences, closed its doors two years ago. Editas also appointed CFO Erick Lucera in May and CSO Linda Burkly in July.

→ On the verge of a possible approval for the notoriously hard-to-treat fatty liver disease NASH, Madrigal Pharmaceuticals said in an SEC filing that chief commercial officer Remy Sukhija has parted ways with the company. It will be up to someone else to lead the commercial strategy for Madrigal’s NASH drug resmetirom, which has a March 14 decision date with the FDA. Sukhija came to Madrigal from Otsuka in April 2020, and his departure marks another major change in leadership at the biotech — earlier this month, Sanofi’s former head of specialty care Bill Sibold succeeded Paul Friedman as CEO, while Julian Baker now chairs the board.

→ John Tsai couldn’t evade the chopping block in the midst of Vas Narasimhan’s reorg at Novartis, and Peer Review has been wondering about his next landing spot ever since. Well, wonder no more: Tsai is a CEO for the first time at Syncona’s Forcefield Therapeutics, a heart disease biotech that launched in April 2022 and was previously led by current Teva chief Richard Francis. “What’s changed,” Tsai told Endpoints News, “is that I have a lot more flexibility and I’m not encumbered by some of the governance and bureaucracy,” and the ex-Novartis medical chief also said Forcefield is shooting for a Series A in the neighborhood of £35 million ($42 million).

→ In another Novartis/Teva connection, Chris Fox will lead the US commercial business at the Israeli generics giant. Fox has been president of Novartis Gene Therapies since December 2021 and at the end of her six years with Amgen, she was promoted to VP and general manager for the bone, cardiometabolic and nephrology business. The last day for Sven Dethlefs — Teva’s EVP, North America commercial who joined the company in 2008 — is slated for Nov. 17.

→ David Stack is retiring as chairman and CEO of Pacira BioSciences, but he’ll stay as a consultant until August 2025. Under Stack’s leadership, the FDA initially approved Pacira’s Exparel in 2011 for postsurgical pain management, and the label has been expanded since. Last year, the Tampa, FL-based biotech posted consecutive Phase III wins with Exparel for pain after knee replacements and bunion surgery. Pacira also merged with Flexion Therapeutics in a deal worth $450 million in October 2021. “Leading Pacira for the last 16 years has been the highlight of my professional career and I am extremely proud of all we have accomplished during that time,” Stack said in a statement.

→ This week in the Flagship family of companies, ProFound Therapeutics has tapped Klaus Urbahns as CSO. Urbahns had held multiple roles at Merck KGaA since 2010, spending the last two years as EMD Serono’s global head of discovery and development technologies and the site head at the EMD Serono Research & Development Institute. In May 2022, Flagship set aside $75 million for ProFound and its expansive library of proteins that it hopes can be used as therapies.

→ Arix Bioscience CEO Robert Lyne will set off for PureTech as chief portfolio officer “by early January 2024.” Arix, a VC firm from the UK, revealed in July it would begin a strategic review that listed “a tax-efficient wind-down of the company” as a possible option. On the day he announced his upcoming departure, Lyne said in a half-year report that Arix is still mulling a decision.

→ Todd Edwards has replaced Ken Lock as chief commercial officer at Arcutis Biotherapeutics, while interim commercial chief Ayisha Jeter has been elevated to SVP, marketing and market access. Since late 2020, Edwards handled the role of group VP and business unit head for Incyte’s immunology business. He was also the head of US immunology and head of global immunology operations and strategy during his seven years at UCB. Lock is currently the chief commercial officer for Acelyrin, which reported a Phase IIb/III flop in izokibep for hidradenitis suppurativa after lighting up the Nasdaq with a $540 million IPO.

→ Shortly after AbbVie ended its off-the-shelf CAR-T alliance with Caribou Biosciences, the chRDNA upstart introduced Reigin Zawadzki as chief people officer. Zawadzki had a 22-year career in human resources with Theravance and its spinoff Theravance Biopharma, and was promoted to chief HR officer in December 2021.

→ Testing the monoclonal antibody briquilimab in chronic spontaneous urticaria and myelodysplastic syndromes, Jasper Therapeutics has named Herb Cross as CFO. We told you about Cross’ departure from Atreca last week, and he was briefly the CFO for ARMO BioSciences, an immuno-oncology biotech that Eli Lilly bought for $1.6 billion in 2018. Jasper has been a Peer Review fixture all year by picking up a CMO, new board members and various execs.

→ Co-founded by Stanford’s Carolyn Bertozzi and UC Davis’ Carlito Lebrilla, glycoproteomics player InterVenn Biosciences has brought aboard Joshua Stahl to steer the ship as CEO. Stahl joins the South San Francisco-based company from former gigs at ArcherDx — having served in a variety of roles at the company, such as CSO and COO — and Invitae Corporation as president of oncology. InterVenn snagged a $201 million Series C megaround back in August 2021, not long after its $34 million Series B.

→ Precision oncology biotech AnHeart Therapeutics has rolled out the welcome mat for Charlotte Arnold as chief corporate affairs officer. Arnold hails from Gyroscope Therapeutics, where she was SVP, corporate affairs. Prior to that, she was with Grail as VP, corporate affairs and at Relypsa as VP, corporate communications and investor relations. Earlier in her career, Arnold had a 10-year run with Genentech.

→ Rockville, MD-based cancer biotech OncoC4 has recruited GSK vet Abid Ansari as CFO. We’ve tracked Ansari since December 2020, when he stepped down as CFO of Precision BioSciences and took on the same role a month later at Artios, steering the Novartis radioligand partner to a $153 million Series C. In March, BioNTech paid $90 million upfront to join forces with OncoC4 on the anti-CTLA-4 program ONC-392.

→ Bob Silverman has been named CBO of Turbine, a cell simulation startup in Budapest that stapled an additional €5.5 million to its original Series A in June. Silverman held various positions at Roche from 1993-2020, closing out his tenure as the Swiss pharma’s head of externalized drug discovery partnering and venture capital lead. He then took the CBO job at Alloy Therapeutics and he’s had subsequent gigs as business chief of Rejuveron Life Sciences and C2i Genomics.

→ CRO Syneos Health is picking up Terttu Haring as president, clinical sites & patients. Haring joins the crew with experience from stints at Sanofi — where she was responsible for clinical research, trial operations, data management and clinical innovation — and Kendle International.

→ Akebia’s chronic kidney disease drug vadadustat has struggled to gain traction with the FDA, as safety concerns led to a CRL in March 2022. But Akebia has refiled an NDA with the agency, and this week Australia became the 35th country to approve the drug, which is known as Vafseo. CEO John Butler has also promoted Graham Ray to VP of key accounts after Ray served as VP of sales since June 2021. Ray had a 23-year career in sales at Takeda and he’ll be responsible for “maximizing the value” of iron tablet Auryxia in addition to laying the groundwork for the commercial launch of vadadustat in the US if the FDA changes its tune.

→ Jim Tananbaum’s Foresite Capital has welcomed Hadi Tabbaa as managing director of investor relations and business development. Tabbaa is a BlackRock alum who comes to Foresite after more than a year at B Capital as a partner and global head of investor relations.

→ Ann Arbor, MI-based Strata Oncology has selected Goz Alhir as SVP, commercialization. Alhir had a 17-year run at Eli Lilly and a brief stint as VP, commercialization and growth strategy for Caris Life Sciences. Merck and Pfizer helped contribute to Strata’s $90 million Series C in July 2021.

→ Last month Veranova picked up chief human resources officer Victoria Brown from Catalent, and now the CDMO has named William Sanders as global VP of chemical development operations. Sanders joins from Actylis, where he served as senior director, research and development. Before that, Sanders had a 16-year stint with MilliporeSigma/SAFC.

→ Viridian Therapeutics, whose Phase III trial with its lead asset VRDN-001 for active thyroid eye disease is ongoing, has added Agios CMO and R&D chief Sarah Gheuens to the board of directors. Another Phase III for chronic TED is in the works.

→ Sentry Hill Partners founder and president Michael Kelly has joined the board of directors at one of this year’s Endpoints 11 winners, Chroma Medicine. Kelly — the acting CFO at Amgen on a pair of occasions — is a board member at several companies, including Amicus Therapeutics and David Liu’s Prime Medicine.

→ Late last month, Mesoblast CEO Silviu Itescu announced that he and CMO Eric Rose were taking a 30% cut to their annual salary in an attempt to have enough cash on hand. Now, the company is bringing in Jane Bell as chair of its audit and risk committee, taking over for retiring chair Michael Spooner. Bell currently serves as chair of the audit and risk committee of Amplia Therapeutics and as deputy chair at Monash Health.

→ Long non-coding RNA specialist NextRNA Therapeutics, one of many companies co-founded by Bob Langer, has reserved a seat for Lori Friedman on the board of directors. Friedman is a 15-year Genentech veteran who’s held the CSO post at ORIC Pharmaceuticals since 2019.

→ Alexion regulatory alum Martine Zimmermann has punched her ticket to the board of directors at San Diego’s Ligand Pharmaceuticals. Zimmermann is in her first year as Ipsen’s head of global regulatory affairs and R&D quality.

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