Synosia Team

Ian Massey is a seasoned pharmaceutical industry senior executive with 30 plus years experience covering all phases of the research and development process across multiple therapeutic areas.   A chemist by training, he directed or made a major contribution to the discovery, preclinical development and early clinical development of approximately 40 new chemical entities that entered clinical studies. More than 20 of those progressed at least to Phase II/clinical proof-of-concept studies.

Before becoming Synosia’s first chief executive officer, Ian was senior vice president of research and preclinical development for Roche Palo Alto where he had built a scientifically strong research and preclinical development group. Ian had been with Roche for 11 years and had played a key leadership role in the creation and strategic design of Roche Bioscience, an entrepreneurial organization created when Roche acquired Syntex in 1994. Prior to joining Roche, Ian was with Syntex Research for 17 years, serving in a variety of R&D management roles.

An author of numerous publications, Ian earned his doctorate in organic chemistry from the University of Oxford, England, and was a postdoctoral research fellow at Stanford University.  He has a bachelor’s degree in chemistry with first class honors and a master’s degree in organic/natural product chemistry.

Mark Moran is co-founder, chief medical advisor and a director of Synosia Therapeutics.

He was a faculty member in the department of medicine at the Stanford University School of Medicine for two years until he joined the pharmaceutical industry in 1986. Mark served in a number of roles in research and development, including senior director of clinical research at Searle/Monsanto until 1991 and chief medical officer at Glycomed until 1995.

He subsequently founded and served as the first chief scientific officer of Intarcia Therapeutics, which is actively developing products to treat cancer and viral diseases. In 1997, Mark became an advisor to Versant Ventures, where he continues to serve as clinical director and serial entrepreneur. In 2005, he co-founded Amira Pharmaceuticals, which focuses on discovering and developing new treatments for asthma and other inflammatory conditions, and served as the acting head of development during the start-up phase of activities.

Mark received his medical degree from the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, an master’s of business administration from the Kellogg School of Northwestern University and a bachelor’s degree in mathematics.

Tom brings to Synosia an investment background, having joined the company from one of the founding investors, Versant Ventures. While at Versant, Tom wrote the business plan and negotiated the license agreements that led to the formation of Synosia. In collaboration with Brad Bolzon, a managing director at Versant, Tom enabled the formation of two additional early stage start-up companies: Amira Pharmaceuticals, where he served as the acting chief business officer, and Sentient Therapeutics, where he continues to serve on the board of directors.

Prior to Versant, Tom worked as a medicinal chemist at XenoPort on methods to improve the gastrointestinal absorption of drug candidates. In this role, he led the development of a new high-throughput screening technology to enable the identification of pathways capable of transporting large molecule therapeutics across the gastrointestinal barrier.

Tom graduated from University of California, Berkeley summa cum laude with highest honors for his bachelor’s degree in English and earned the departmental citation for his bachelor’s in chemistry. Tom went on to earn his doctorate in organic chemistry as an NSF fellow at Stanford University.

Steve Bandak is a physician with a depth of experience in the CNS area. During his career he has had a range of responsibilities, including the design and conduct of clinical studies, building clinical research capabilities and successfully negotiating with regulatory authorities

He most recently served as vice president of medical and regulatory affairs with Novavax, Inc. in Rockville, MD., but the majority of his career was with pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly where he rose to the position of Medical Director. At Lilly, Steve was involved in the development of Prozac®; Zyprexa®, Cymbalta® and Strattera® as well as building clinical research capabilities and successfully negotiating with regulatory authorities.

Steve was educated and trained in Guy's Hospital Medical School, University of London and did his internship and internal medicine residency at Guy's Group Hospitals in London and neurology residency at the Royal Free Hospital in London.

Lesley Pickford has extensive experience in both the biotech and pharmaceutical industries and in academic research. During the 21 years she has worked in research and development (R&D), she held various leadership positions with responsibilities from discovery through to commercial release. She had key management roles in the discovery, preclinical phases and clinical development of several candidates, leading to marketing approvals.

Before joining Synosia, Lesley was with ALZA Corporation, working on the global approval and product release for a new product for chronic pain. Previously, she held senior management positions at Calyx Therapeutics, Corixa Corporation and Connectics Corporation, including establishing pharmacology and toxicology departments.

Lesley holds numerous patents and has extensive publications to her credit. She earned her doctorate in medical biochemistry from Flinders University of South Australia and was a postdoctoral fellow in pathology and psychiatry at Stanford University. Her bachelor's degree is in biochemistry and physiology with first class honors from Adelaide University, and she received her master's of business administration from the Executive Program at Leavey School of Business at Santa Clara University.

Michael Eison is an experienced drug developer and a seasoned veteran of regulatory affairs. He spent the first 15 years of his career in central nervous system (CNS) drug discovery/science management and the subsequent 11 years in regulatory affairs formulating regulatory strategies that anticipate the needs of the marketplace as well as those of worldwide health authorities.

Most recently, he was vice president of research and development for the Palo Alto site of Stiefel Laboratories, but the majority of his career was with the Bristol-Myers Squibb Company. He joined them as a scientist in 1981 and ultimately became the director of CNS drug discovery before changing career direction and becoming a director in regulatory affairs. He joined InterMune in 2002 as senior director regulatory affairs and Connetics in 2005 as vice president of regulatory affairs.

Michael earned his bachelor's degree in psychology in 1975 at the State University of New York at Buffalo and was awarded his doctorate in physiological psychology/psychopharmacology from UCLA in 1980.

Ann Neale has more than 18 years of clinical development experience in the pharmaceutical/biopharmaceutical industry in the United States, Canada and Europe. Ann brings both therapeutic and business experience to Synosia and expertise in strategic planning to take lead molecules into clinical development.

Before joining Synosia, Ann was vice president of clinical operations at Saegis Pharmaceuticals, responsible for the strategic planning and clinical development of the company's central nervous system (CNS) compounds. She also has extensive experience in development operations for other companies including ARYx Therapeutics and Mimetix Incorporated, as well as being a principal in WinPharm Associates, a clinical drug development consulting company.

Ann received her bachelor's of science in nursing degree from the University of Minnesota and is the author of a several publications and abstracts.

Tom Malefyt has significant pharmaceutical industry experience in manufacturing, pre-formulation evaluation, formulation, analysis, documentation, and registration of new drugs.

Prior to joining Synosia, Tom led a pharmaceutical start-up effort to evaluate and refine a cell-specific drug delivery technology and an antigen-specific T-cell modulation technology from the University of Kansas.

Since first joining the pharmaceutical industry at SmithKline and French Laboratories in 1984, Tom has acquired experience in managing the chemistry, manufacturing and controls (CMC) development of both early-phase and late-phase drug candidates, in both large and small pharmaceutical companies. Tom joined Syntex Research (later Roche) in 1988, where he held positions of increasing leadership and responsibility. He has developed traditional small molecule, peptide, recombinant vaccine and protein drug candidates.

Tom earned his doctorate in chemistry at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and gained further experience with postdoctoral fellowships at the University of Queensland (enzymology), and the University of Kansas (pharmaceutical chemistry).

Michael Mulqueen brings to Synosia knowledge of business development and alliance management, along with a scientific background. Most recently, he was global head of alliances at Roche and a member of several senior decision-making bodies within Roche.

From 1988 to 2001, Michael worked in the Roche United Kingdom research group on both anti-inflammatory and anti-viral projects and was actively involved in managing several key relationships with external partners. Prior to joining Roche, he worked for seven years in the inflammation research unit at Rhone Poulenc Rorer.

He holds a bachelor's degree in pharmacology from the University of Liverpool, England.

Hervé Girsault has extensive experience in business development and licensing in the pharmaceutical industry. Until July 2005, he held a number of senior positions at Novartis, including senior vice president and global head of partnering and out-licensing at Novartis Pharmaceuticals in Basel, global head of business development & licensing for Novartis Consumer Health and general manager of Novartis Consumer Health in Benelux.

Before joining Novartis, Hervé was the general manager of Gerber Products Company in France from 1990 to 1995. He started his professional career with Coopers & Lybrand Management Consultants, culminating in the position of director of the food & healthcare practices, based in Paris. He earned an master's of business administration with honors from Columbia Business School in New York and has a master's degree from a leading business school in Paris.

Jay Shukert has more than 10 years of experience as a consultant chief financial officer to biotechnology and medical device companies. In this role, he has managed equity and debt financings, raising more than $235 million, developed strategic plans and implemented financial strategies, developed product evaluation methods which considered financial resources, potential markets and FDA guidelines and reviewed and monitored FAR, SBIR and GPRA reporting issues.

Previously, Jay held senior finance positions at CV Therapeutics, Neurex Corporation, Genentech and Arthur Andersen. He received his master's of business administration from the University of California, Berkeley and a bacheolor's degree in civil engineering from University of Pennsylvania.

Zack McNealy has 10 years of experience as a financial analyst, finance manager and controller for healthcare companies. During his career, he has provided analysis and recommendations on multi-million dollar development budgets, as well as managed all finance activities related to sales and marketing for major products.

Before joining Synosia, Zack was with two Johnson & Johnson companies - Cordis Corporation, where he last served as controller for their LuMend, Inc plant, and Ethicon Endo-Surgery, where he worked as a financial analyst both in sales and marketing and in research and development.

Zack, a certified management accountant who is also certified in financial management, received his bachelor's of science degree in accounting and finance from Ohio's Miami University.

Kathleen Martin is an accomplished project and alliance manager with a track record of planning and executing development projects to achieve business and project objectives. She brings broad drug discovery experience to Synosia, including responsibility as head of the program management function, project manager, alliance manager and research project leader.

From 2001 to 2006 when she joined Synosia, Kathleen was with Renovis, Inc, where she held a number of key management positions. Before joining Renovis, she worked in neurobiology at Incyte Genomics and at Chiron Corporation in small molecule drug discovery and growth factor discovery.

A holder of two patents and author of numerous publications, Kathleen earned a doctorate in neurobiology from Yale University School of Medicine, a master's of science degree in psychology, also from Yale, and conducted postdoctoral research at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at UCLA.

Christine Matthews

Alannah Chase has worked in the biotech industry for more than 15 years, managing facilities, offices and events. In her career, she has been responsible for a wide range of administrative functions, including coordination of meetings, issuance of confidential materials, training new employee and overseeing maintenance of building system services.

When she was with Axon Instruments before joining Synosia, Alannah facilitated a major company move into a new, larger facility, overseeing completion of $1.3 million in improvements.

Alannah received her associate's degree from College of Notre Dame.

Uwe Meya is a board-qualified neurologist and psychiatrist by background with an impressive track record in pharmaceutical research and development, focused on disorders of the central nervous system (CNS). His experience spans multiple CNS indications and covers the full spectrum of drug development from first-in-man through to regulatory filing.

He was most recently head of research portfolio management for Roche in Basel, where he contributed to the global strategic direction of all therapeutic areas. While at Roche and Novartis, he worked on several of the compounds subsequently out-licensed to Synosia and received the Roche Global Development Leadership Reward in recognition of his effectiveness in building relationships and partnerships.

Prior to joining Roche in Basel, Uwe was with Novartis where he managed a team of researchers in CNS clinical development and later served as a member of a special clinical development management team, overseeing projects from late pre-clinical studies through to the end of Phase I. He previously worked at Ciba-Geigy, Knoll and Schering in CNS research.

Uwe was educated in Germany and studied medicine in Aachen, Germany and Glasgow, Scotland. He received his medical degree from the University of Aachen, where he also completed a doctorate in psychiatry.

He is a member of the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology and is a founding member of the International College of Geriatric Psychoneuropharmacology, where he served as a council member for more than three years.

A molecular biologist by training and an experienced biotech entrepreneur, Dr. Blanc also helped biotech and pharma clients with R&D, commercial and strategy issues as associate partner with the business consultants McKinsey & Company. In his 13 years in the pharmaceutical and biotech industry, he has worked at the interface between strategy, research and development management, business development and operational delivery.

Antony, who also heads Synosia’s Basel operation, most recently served as head of biopharma for Syngenta, a world leading agribusiness based in Basel, where he built a pipeline of eight projects within 24 months. Previously, he was vice president of business development at Synt:em in France where he established strategic alliances and out-licensed the company’s technologies and products.

Antony earned his bachelor’s of science degree in biochemistry with a minor in biotechnology and his doctorate in molecular biology from McGill University in Montreal, Canada.

Philippe Lutz brought nearly a decade of experience in banking and finance to Synosia when he joined as the company’s first chief financial officer. In his career, he has contributed to a broad range of capital market transactions.

Before joining Synosia, Philippe was vice president of the global markets solutions group for Credit Suisse Investment Banking, his latest position in a nine-year tenure with the Swiss company.

Philippe, a Swiss national who is based at the company’s headquarters in Basel, earned his masters in business administration from the University of St. Gallen, majoring in finance and capital markets. He also successfully completed the chartered financial analyst (CFA) exams while at Credit Suisse.