KOVINA - Key Persons

After receiving a doctorate as a protein structural chemist from the Weizmann Institute, Israel, Dr. Podjarny held academic positions at the University of Chicago and the University of Strasbourg, where he served as a Research Director first class at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) and as a team leader. His main scientific interest is the development of crystallographic methodology and its application to biological problems, mainly neutron diffraction and ultra-high resolution crystallography. Furthermore, Dr. Podjarny is particularly interested in subatomic resolution X-Ray and neutron protein crystallography for the structural study of enzymatic reactions, pharmaceutical targets and its application to rational drug design. He has significant experience in the crystallographic determination of protein-ligand complexes, both for academics and industry, including the crystal structure of the HPV E6/E6AP/p53 complex. Dr. Podjarny has received the prize of the best thesis at the Weizmann Institute (1975) and the Honor Medal, CNRS

Job Titles:

• Vice President of Finance

Ms. Beeler is the Vice President of Finance at Kovina Therapeutics. Her background includes extensive experience in corporate and biotech operational finance and accounting. She possesses experience and expertise in financial reporting, business planning, technical accounting, compliance, and treasury. Prior to joining Kovina, Ms. Beeler was the Executive Director of Finance at VMS BioMarketing, a healthcare marketing firm focused on improving patient outcomes for pharma and biotech clients. Her prior experience includes controllership positions for several private biotech companies (Marcadia Biotech, Calibrium LLC, AgeneBio), as well as treasury and corporate financial positions at Eli Lilly& Company. She started her career in audit services at Deloitte. Ms. Beeler earned her BS in Accounting from Fairfield University, Connecticut, and a MA in Business Education from the University of Indianapolis. She is also a Certified Public Accountant.

Job Titles:

• Founder
• Professor

Dr. Samy Meroueh is a Professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the Indiana University School of Medicine and a co-founder of Kovina Therapeutics. Dr. Meroueh received his PhD in the Department of Chemistry at Wayne State University in the laboratory of William L. Hase. There, he explored and developed methods to model intermolecular forces that drive molecular recognition and ensuing chemical reactions in biological molecules. As a postdoc at the University of Notre dame in the laboratory of Dr. Shahriar Mobashery he was trained in bioorganic chemistry. He was co-mentored by Dr. Jed Fisher, a medicinal chemist who had spent more than two decades in the pharmaceutical industry. At Notre Dame, he developed mechanism-based covalent small-molecule enzyme inhibitors targeting matrix metalloproteinases, cathepsins, and beta-lactamases. In his laboratory at Indiana University, he develops small molecules that modulate the function of proteins that are considered undruggable, such as members of the RAS and Rho GTPase superfamily, transcription factors and co-activators such as Hippo pathway TEAD and YAP, and proteins involved in tight protein-protein interactions like the urokinase receptor or the HPV E6 oncogene. Dr. Meroueh was the recipient of the American Cancer Society Research Scholar Grant in cancer drug discovery. His laboratory has been continuously funded by the National Cancer Institute and the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Meroueh is a member of the Department of Veterans Affairs, and the Indiana University School of Medicine Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center.

Job Titles:

• Vice President of Medicinal Chemistry

Dr. Zhijian Lu is a company founder and the Vice President of Medicinal Chemistry for Kovina Therapeutics. Dr. Lu received his PhD in organic chemistry from Rutgers University and spent nearly 19 years at Merck followed by 10 years working in drug discovery including 5 years as the CEO of a biotech providing support to pharmaceutical clients. Dr. Lu's drug discovery efforts focused on a wide variety of therapeutic areas including antiviral, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and cancer. Throughout his career, he actively participated in multiple discovery projects from lead identification through phase III trials gaining extensive expertise in drug metabolism and pharmacokinetics as well as off-target activities. Dr. Lu is a co-inventor on nearly 30 patents and has more than 20 publications.

Job Titles:

• Chief Scientific Officer
• Company Founder
• Founder

Dr. Androphy is a company founder and Kovina's Chief Scientific Officer. Dr. Androphy is the Kampen-Norins Professor and Chair of the Department of Dermatology at Indiana University School of Medicine. He received the MD from the University of Rochester followed by residency at the University of Pittsburgh. After a 4-year post-doctoral fellowship at the National Cancer Institute/NIH where he investigated the molecular biology of papillomaviruses, he began his academic career at Tufts Medical Center, where he continued to study papillomaviruses. His lab cloned the gene that was later identified to be the genetic defect in spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) and identified the importance of RNA splicing in SMA. In 2001, he was appointed as the inaugural Barbara and Nathan Greenberg Professor and Vice Chair for Research of the Department of Medicine and Director of the MD/PhD Program at the University of Massachusetts Medical School. There his research team studied the mechanism of alternative mRNA splicing and discovered the antisense oligonucleotide that was licensed to Ionis Pharmaceuticals that became the first FDA approved treatment for SMA in 2016. In 2010, his lab moved to IU where he continues to pursue development of novel therapeutics for the treatment of papillomavirus infections and associated cancers. His research programs in HPV and SMA have been continuously funded by NIH grants since 1987, and he is an inventor on multiple patents. In 2020, he co-founded Kovina Therapeutics Inc. to advance the discovery of HPV small molecule inhibitors.

Mr. French was named Board Chairman in February 2021. Mr. French has been in the life science industry for the majority of his career, working with pharmaceutical and medical device companies, both large and small. He currently serves as Chairman of the Board of On Target Laboratories, which is in late-stage development of a fluorescent imaging technology that enables surgeons to see and remove more diseased tissue. Mr. French has served as Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of two start-up biopharmaceutical companies in the diabetes and obesity area, Calibrium (acquired by Novo Nordisk) and Marcadia Biotech (acquired by Roche). He also served as CEO of two life science start-up medical device companies in the cardiovascular field, Corvascular. and Zephyr Medical. Previously, Mr. French was a senior executive at cardiovascular device company, Guidant Corporation (acquired by Boston Scientific), including roles as Vice President, Global Marketing for the Vascular Intervention division and VP, Corporate Marketing and Communications. Earlier in his career, he held numerous marketing, sales, international and general management positions for Eli Lilly's Medical Device Division and Guidant. Mr. French currently serves on the board of trustees of Marian University. He volunteers at Catholic Charities of Indianapolis and has served on several community organization boards. Mr. French earned a B.S. in Business from Indiana University and an M.B.A. from Harvard University.

After training as a synthetic organic chemist, Dr. Pearce served for 27-years at Eli Lilly and Co. in the areas of cancer drug discovery and clinical development.  As Lilly's presence in oncology grew, Dr. Pearce held several positions of increasing responsibility, ultimately as Vice President of Cancer Research and Clinical Investigation and as Distinguished Research Fellow, Cancer Research. During this time Lilly's cancer drug discovery group introduced 25 investigational drugs into clinical trials, and 3 new drugs were approved for the treatment of cancer by worldwide regulatory agencies including GEMZAR and ALIMTA. Dr. Pearce retired from Lilly in 2006, and has served in several board, consulting, and advisory roles in the academic, government and biopharmaceutical communities. Dr. Pearce received a BS degree in chemistry from Texas A&M University in 1974 and was awarded a PhD in organic chemistry from Harvard University in 1979. In 2006 he was named a "Hero of Chemistry" by the American Chemical Society.

Dr. Vousden received her PhD from the University of London and, following postdoctoral fellowships at the ICR and the National Cancer Institute, she returned to London to establish a research group at the Ludwig Institute. Returning to the US, she was Chief of the Regulation of Cell Growth Laboratory at the NCI before coming back to the UK to take on the role of Director of the CRUK Beatson Institute in Glasgow. In 2016, she became Chief Scientist at CRUK and moved her research group to the Francis Crick Institute in London. Dr. Vousden's research has focused on the tumor suppressor protein p53. She has made contributions to our understanding of how p53 is regulated and the functions of p53 that contribute to its ability to control cancer progression.  She revealed an unexpected ability of p53 to help cells adapt and survive under transient periods of nutrient starvation, work that has led to a more general investigation of cancer cell metabolism. More recently, she has been exploring the role of oxidative stress and serine metabolism in cancer development and progression.

Job Titles:

• CEO
• CEO Role

Ms. Sherman assumed the CEO role for Kovina Therapeutics in April 2021. Prior to joining Kovina, she served as the Chief Operating Officer for VMS BioMarketing, a healthcare marketing firm focused on improving patient outcomes for pharma and biotech clients. Her prior experience includes serving as the Chief Financial Officer for private biotech companies such as Calibrium, LLC until its acquisition by Novo Nordisk in 2015 and Marcadia Biotech which was purchased by Roche in 2010. Ms. Sherman also worked as the Vice President and Treasurer for Guidant Corporation during the sale of Guidant to Abbott and Boston Scientific and previously served as Guidant's first financial director for the emerging markets region located in Belgium. In addition, Ms. Sherman worked as Guidant's Assistant Treasurer during the company's spin-off from Eli Lilly and Company. She began her career in finance and human resources with Eli Lilly and Company. Ms. Sherman is the incoming Chair for the Community Health Network Board of Directors and the current Chair of the Audit, Compliance and Finance Committee. She is also a board member and Chair of the Audit Committee for Lacy Diversified Industries. Ms. Sherman earned her BA in economics from DePauw University and an MBA from The Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth.

Dr. Barbosa has more than two decades of experience leading drug discovery and development programs at major pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. Currently, Dr Barbosa is Advisor to several organizations in the health care field. Dr. Barbosa was Global Head and Vice President of Immunology Research and External Innovation at Janssen Research & Development, where he oversaw Immunology Research and new initiatives, including approved drugs STELARA and TREMFYA. In addition, Dr. Barbosa held positions of increasing responsibility managing new drug R&D programs at prominent biopharmaceutical firms, including Centocor, Signal Pharmaceuticals, Chugai Biopharma, TRL USA, Mirna Therapeutics and Assembly Biosciences. Dr. Barbosa received a BS, Genetics degree from the University of California, Davis and a PhD, Microbiology & Immunology from the University of California, Los Angeles. He completed a post-doctoral fellowship at the National Cancer Institute.

Job Titles:

• Vice President of Chemistry, Manufacturing & Control

Dr. Shivanand serves as the Vice President of Chemistry, Manufacturing & Control (CMC) for Kovina Therapeutics. Her background includes a broad range of early and late-stage product development experiences including drug substance and drug product development, formulation and process development, analytical development, and CMC quality and regulatory topics. Dr. Shivanand has more than 20 years of experience in pharmaceutical product development, having started her career with the product development group at ALZA Corporation, and Johnson & Johnson. During her work at ALZA and Johnson & Johnson, she was responsible for formulation development, process development, and product optimization activities for multiple products, including the oral controlled release product CONCERTA®. In addition, Dr. Shivanand co-founded a CMC consulting firm supporting multiple drug discovery companies prior to serving as Vice President of CMC at Expansion Therapeutics. During her career, she has worked on the development of more than 25 molecules for various routes of administration, leading to several successful regulatory submissions and product approvals. She is an inventor on 9 issued patents and has several peer reviewed publications. Dr. Shivanand also serves as Adjunct Faculty at Purdue University in the Biotechnology Innovation and Regulatory Science program. Dr. Shivanand received her Bachelor of Pharmacy from the University of Mumbai and her M.S. and Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Sciences, both from the University of Cincinnati.

Dr. Mahony joined the Kovina board as a director in June 2021. From 2011 until her retirement in August 2018, she served as Senior Vice President and President of Lilly Oncology and was a member of the executive committee at Eli Lilly and Company. Before that, Dr. Mahony served in a variety of leadership roles at Lilly including Senior Vice President Human Resources and Diversity, President and General Manager Lilly Canada, and Executive Director Global Product Development. Dr. Mahony joined Lilly in 2000 after more than a decade in sales and marketing roles for Schering-Plough, Amgen and Bristol-Myers Squibb. Currently she serves as a member of the board of directors of four publicly traded companies; Horizon Therapeutics plc, Vifor Pharma AG, Assembly Biosciences Inc, and Zymeworks, Inc. She also serves on the board of the Chordoma Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the lives of those affected by Chordoma. Dr. Mahony earned a Bachelor of Science and Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in pharmacy from Aston University, as well as a Master of Business Administration from London Business School in the UK. She was awarded an honorary doctorate from Aston University and has been recognized as one of the Indianapolis Business Journal's "Women of Influence."

Job Titles:

• Advisor

Dr. Reddy serves as a Toxicology Advisor for Kovina Therapeutics. He is an experienced drug development professional with over thirty years of experience in global pharmaceutical drug discovery and development with Sanofi and then Eli Lilly & Company. Dr. Reddy led nonclinical safety and regulatory assessments on several early and late-stage cross-functional oncology and endocrine/neuro programs. In addition, Dr. Reddy provided scientific consultation and expertise, including design of clinical development plans, and interpretation of regulatory guidance. He was a critical contributor in delivering nonclinical toxicology packages to support first in human studies (INDs) for many drug candidates and successfully submitted two NDAs (Evista, Alimta) and two BLAs(Cyramza and Lartruvo). During his tenure at Lilly, he developed a strong regulatory and drug development expertise, interacted with worldwide regulatory agencies, and addressed safety issues for drugs during pre-IND, end of Phase II, pre-NDA, pre BLA, NDA, BLA, FDA, EU and PMDA (Japan) meetings. In addition, Dr. Reddy worked as an ICH S9 Expert Working Group (EWG) member and played an active role as a US Pharma representative in drafting ICH S9 guidance document for developing anticancer pharmaceuticals. Dr. Reddy received his PhD., from Utah State University, MS from the University of Mississippi Medical Center and DVM (BVSc) from A.P. Agricultural University, India. He completed his post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. Dr. Reddy has numerous publications and organized and chaired symposium and continuing education courses at national and international meetings and NCI/FDA workshops.

Job Titles:

• Medical and Clinical Development Advisor

Dr. Nichols serves as a Medical and Clinical Development Advisor for Kovina Therapeutics. He received his medical degree and trained in Internal Medicine at Duke University prior to earning a Masters degree in Epidemiology and completing a fellowship in Infectious Diseases at the University of Washington. He spent four years on the faculty of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, Washington, where he was the Head of Infection Control and the principal investigator on NIH-funded grants exploring the prevention and treatment of viral infections in hematopoietic cell transplant (HCT) recipients. Dr. Nichols led multiple global development multiple global antiviral programs in the United States and Europe for Glaxo Smith Kline and ViiV Healthcare, including the full Phase 2 and Phase 3 development and global regulatory submissions that led to the approval of dolutegravir (TIVICAY)and its fixed dose combination product (TRIUMEQ) for the treatment of patients living with HIV, leading to his appointment as the Head of Clinical Development for ViiV. He was the Chief Medical Officer at Chimerix from 2014-2020,developing brincidofovir (TEMBEXA) for the treatment of dsDNA viral infections in HCT recipients with hematologic malignancies and solid organ transplant recipients; TEMBEXA was ultimately approved by the FDA as a medical countermeasure for smallpox infections. In April 2020, he joined Istari Oncology as its Chief Medical Officer in order to develop its viral immunotherapeutic (lerapolturev, PVSRIPO) for the treatment of several solid tumors, including glioblastoma, melanoma, bladder cancer, and squamous cell cancer of the head and neck.

Job Titles:

• Director

Mr. Ringo became a director in June 2021. From 2010 until 2015, Mr. Ringo served as a Senior Advisor at Barclays Capital, the global investment banking division of Barclays Bank PLC, and as Strategic Advisor at Sofinnova Ventures, a life sciences-focused investment firm. From April 2008 until his retirement in April 2010, Mr. Ringo served as Senior Vice President of Strategy and Business Development for Pfizer and was responsible for guiding Pfizer's overall strategic planning and business development activities. Prior to joining Pfizer, Mr. Ringo was President and Chief Executive Officer of Abgenix, a public biotechnology company acquired by Amgen in 2005. His experience in the global pharmaceutical sector also includes nearly 30 years with Eli Lilly and Co., where he held a number of executive roles and was a member of Lilly's operating committee. Mr. Ringo currently serves as a director of Assembly Biosciences and recently served as a director of Dermira (acquired by Eli Lilly and Co.) and Five Prime Therapeutics (acquired by Amgen), both public biotechnology companies prior to acquisition. He previously served as a director of Immune Design, Sangamo Biosciences, Mirati Technologies and Onyx Pharmaceuticals, each of which was a public company during Mr. Ringo's service as a director. Mr. Ringo received a BS in Business Administration and an MBA from the University of Dayton.