TIDMPRTC
PureTech Health PLC
05 March 2019
5 March 2019
PureTech Health plc
PureTech Health Affiliate Karuna Announces Appointment of Chief
Financial Officer
PureTech Health plc (LSE: PRTC) ("PureTech Health"), an advanced
biopharmaceutical company developing novel medicines for
dysfunctions of the Brain-Immune-Gut (BIG) axis, today announced
that its affiliate, Karuna Pharmaceuticals, has appointed Mr. Troy
Ignelzi as chief financial officer. Mr. Ignelzi brings 25 years of
experience to Karuna, having most recently served as chief
financial officer of scPharmaceuticals where he led the company's
transition from a privately-held, clinical-stage company to a
publicly-traded biopharma preparing for commercial launch.
Eric Elenko, PhD, chief innovation office at PureTech Health,
said: "Troy is an exceptional addition to Karuna's team, bringing
25 years of financial leadership across mid- to late-stage biotech.
We welcome this continued internal growth at Karuna as they advance
lead product candidate KarXT through a Phase 2 study for psychosis
in schizophrenia."
The full text announcement from Karuna is as follows:
Karuna Strengthens Senior Leadership Team with Appointment of
Chief Financial Officer
BOSTON, March 5, 2019-Karuna Pharmaceuticals, Inc. ("Karuna"),
focused on targeting muscarinic cholinergic receptors for the
treatment of neuropsychiatric disorders marked by psychosis and
cognitive impairment, as well as pain, today announced that Mr.
Troy Ignelzi has joined the company as its chief financial officer.
Karuna's senior leadership team has been strengthened in recent
months with key additions and promotions in its R&D,
preclinical and finance functions.
"We are pleased to welcome Troy to our leadership team. He will
play an important role in guiding external financing and internal
financial controls as we continue along our next phase of growth,"
said Steve Paul, M.D., chief executive officer and chairman of
Karuna. "As our lead product candidate KarXT advances in clinical
development for multiple indications, we plan to continue to expand
our leadership team. Troy's experience as CFO at both private and
public biotechnology companies will be a considerable asset."
Mr. Ignelzi has spent 25 years supporting companies in finance,
business development and operations. He joins Karuna from
scPharmaceuticals, where in his role as chief financial officer, he
helped oversee development from a privately-held clinical-stage
company to a publicly-traded biopharma preparing for commercial
launch. Prior to scPharmaceuticals, Mr. Ignelzi was a senior
executive at Juventas Therapeutics, Esperion Therapeutics, and
Insys Therapeutics, helping raise public/private capital, expand
development pipelines through licensing/acquisition and advancing
critical therapies, several of which are currently approved by the
FDA. He also brings relevant commercial experience, having launched
and promoted CNS drugs while at Eli Lilly. Mr. Ignelzi received a
B.S. in Accounting from Ferris State University.
"I am delighted to join the Karuna leadership team and look
forward to providing support to advance KarXT's clinical
development for the treatment of patients suffering with
schizophrenia, Alzheimer's disease, and pain," said Mr. Ignelzi.
"It is an exciting time in the company's development and I look
forward to working with Steve and the rest of the leadership team
at Karuna to help bring our innovative products to patients and
their families."
Reporting to Mr. Ignelzi is Mr. Jason Parker Brown, vice
president of finance. Mr. Brown joins Karuna from PureTech Health
where he supported the financing and operational growth of PureTech
Health and its affiliates as vice president of corporate finance.
Prior to PureTech Health, Mr. Brown spent five years at Novartis in
roles of increasing responsibility within the finance department.
Mr. Brown will lead the finance and accounting functions at Karuna.
He holds an MBA from Boston College and B.A. from Hamilton
College.
About KarXT
KarXT (Karuna-Xanomeline-Trospium), Karuna's lead product
candidate for the treatment of psychosis in schizophrenia, consists
of xanomeline, a novel muscarinic acetylcholine receptor agonist
that has demonstrated clinical activity in placebo-controlled human
trials in schizophrenia and Alzheimer's disease, and trospium
chloride, an FDA-approved and well-established muscarinic receptor
antagonist that has been shown not to enter the central nervous
system (CNS). KarXT is designed to selectively target M1/M4
muscarinic receptors in the brain while blocking their activation
in peripheral tissues in order to improve tolerability as compared
to xanomeline alone. Karuna has completed two Phase 1 clinical
studies which demonstrated a clinically meaningful reduction in
side effects compared to xanomeline and that KarXT is well
tolerated in healthy volunteers. A proprietary co-formulation of
xanomeline and trospium in a single capsule was used in the second
Phase 1 study and is now being evaluated in an ongoing Phase 2
study in schizophrenic patients with acute psychosis. Top-line data
from this study are anticipated by the end of 2019.
About Karuna Pharmaceuticals
Karuna is a clinical-stage drug development company targeting
muscarinic cholinergic receptors for the treatment of psychosis and
cognitive impairment across central nervous system (CNS) disorders,
including schizophrenia and Alzheimer's disease, as well as pain.
Karuna's lead product candidate, KarXT,
(Karuna-Xanomeline-Trospium) is being evaluated in a Phase 2 study
in people with schizophrenia, with top-line results anticipated at
the end of 2019. Karuna, which was founded by PureTech Health (LSE:
PRTC), has a worldwide exclusive license for xanomeline and has a
patent portfolio more broadly covering selective muscarinic
targeting enabled by the KarXT approach. For more information,
visit www.karunapharma.com.
About PureTech Health
PureTech Health (LSE: PRTC) is an advanced biopharmaceutical
company developing BIG medicines for dysfunctions of the
Brain-Immune-Gut Axis. The Company has gained deep insights into
the connection between these systems and the resulting role in
diseases that have proven resistant to established therapeutic
approaches. By harnessing this emerging field of human biology,
PureTech Health is developing new categories of medicines with the
potential to have great impact on people with serious diseases.
PureTech Health is advancing a rich pipeline of innovative
therapies with an unbiased, non-binary, and capital efficient
R&D model across its affiliates and its internal labs.
PureTech's affiliates include seven clinical-stage platforms with
two product candidates that have been filed with the US Food and
Drug Administration (FDA) for review and other novel pre-clinical
programmes. The PureTech Health pipeline includes ground-breaking
platforms and therapeutic candidates that were developed in
collaboration with some of the world's leading experts.
PureTech's internal research and development is centred on
tissue-selective immunomodulation for the treatment of oncology,
autoimmune, and CNS-related disorders, with a near-term focus on
targeting newly-discovered, foundational immunosuppressive
mechanisms in oncology and novel approaches that harness the
lymphatic infrastructure.
For more information, visit www.puretechhealth.com or connect
with us on Twitter @puretechh.
Contact:
Investors EU media US media
Allison Mead Talbot Ben Atwell, Rob Winder Tom Donovan
+1 617 651 3156 +44 (0) 20 3727 1000 +1 857 559 3397
amt@puretechhealth.com ben.atwell@FTIconsulting.com tom@tenbridgecommunications.com
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END
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