We are starting with the future, now.
Purespring is a fully integrated company, with the building blocks in place to move rapidly through clinical validation to transform the treatment of kidney diseases as rapidly as possible.
LEADERSHIP TEAM
Julian Hanak.
Chief Executive Officer
Julian is the CEO of Purespring Therapeutics.
Julian joined Purespring in June 2021 as Chief Development Officer before becoming CEO. He has worked in the biotechnology and biopharmaceutical sector for more than 25 years, holding senior leadership positions in small biotech, CDMO and large pharma companies.
Prior to Purespring, Julian worked at Biogen, where he was SVP and the global Head of Gene Therapy Product and Process Development. Before this, he was at Nightstar Therapeutics and Cobra Biologics, where he gained extensive gene therapy drug development, manufacturing, and business development experience.
Julian also held roles at Astra Zeneca and in research at the National Institute for Medical Research (MRC) and Bioproducts Laboratories. He holds a BSc (Hons) in Biochemistry from University College London and completed his MSc at Bangor University.
Sachin Kelkar.
Chief Financial Officer
Sachin Kelkar is the CFO of Purespring Therapeutics.
Sachin joined Purespring as strategic finance lead after a 25-year-plus career spanning finance, life sciences and technology.
Prior to Purespring, Sachin served as CFO at biodesign startup Geltor, where he built the finance and operations functions while raising significant venture financing.
Before joining Geltor, Sachin held senior leadership positions in health and technology startup companies, worked as a healthcare investment banker and co-founded a life sciences boutique banking firm.
Sachin holds a BA in Molecular and Cell Biology from the University of California, Berkeley, and an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.
Moin Saleem.
Co-founder & Chief Scientific Advisor
Moin Saleem is a Co-founder & Chief Scientific Advisor to Purespring Therapeutics.
Moin is also Professor of Paediatric Renal Medicine at the University of Bristol and Director of Bristol Renal, a glomerular research group of approximately 45 researchers, covering all areas from cell biology, transgenic models and population cohorts and genetics.
Moin is the originator of the gold-standard human podocyte cell lines, used worldwide for academic and industry research. Moin also set up the UK Renal Rare Disease Registry (RaDaR) and is currently leading the UK nephrotic syndrome study (NephroS), as well as a major industry-academic collaboration termed NURTuRE (National Unified Renal Translational Research Enterprise).
Moin’s gene therapy programme commenced in 2014 and is focused on targeting the podocyte in order to radically change the treatment of kidney diseases. Moin trained as an undergraduate at University College, London, and is a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians. His PhD was in transplantation immunology at the Institute of Child Health, London, followed by Paediatric Nephrology training at Great Ormond Street Hospital, London.
Alice Brown.
Chief Scientific Officer
Alice Brown is the CSO of Purespring Therapeutics.
Prior to joining Purespring, Alice was a Senior Director in the department of Cell Therapy Innovation at Takeda Pharmaceuticals following the acquisition by Takeda of GammaDelta Therapeutics in 2021, where Alice had held the roles of VP Research and, before that, VP Gene Engineering.
At GammaDelta Alice built and lead the research team and was responsible for developing multiple cell therapy programs from discovery through to completion of pre-clinical development. Alice joined GammaDelta from PsiOxus Therapeutics where she was the Director of Biology.
Alice holds a degree and PhD in Biochemistry from the University of Bristol and carried out her post-doctoral research in Immunology at Imperial College London.
Fredrik Erlandsson.
Chief Medical Officer
Fredrik Erlandsson is the CMO of Purespring Therapeutics.
Fredrik joined Purespring as an experienced developer of novel nephrology drugs, having worked in all phases of drug development and medical affairs across large pharma and biotech.
Prior to Purespring, Fredrik served as Head Global Clinical Development at CSL Vifor. He has previously held positions within the clinical development teams at AstraZeneca, Bayer, and Antisoma.
He holds a medical degree and PhD from from the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden.
Peter Mulcahy.
Chief People Officer
Peter Mulcahy is the CPO of Purespring Therapeutics.
As CPO Peter is focused on ensuring our people can thrive at work by creating inclusive experiences and a culture to deliver our ambition for patients. He brings over 25 years’ experience and expertise linking people and business strategies across a broad range of HR including talent management, culture transformation and strategic organisation design and development.
Prior to Purespring, Peter worked for 11 years at GSK, where he held various roles including: VP HR; VP Talent, Learning and OD and Global Head of Coaching & Organisation Development. Prior to that he was Head of Leadership Development at AXA.
Peter holds a BSc in IT and Management from Birkbeck, University of London, is a certified OD Practitioner from the NTL Institute for Applied Behavioural Science and a CIPD accredited executive coach with Oxford Brooks University.
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
John Tsai.
Acting Chairman of the Board
John Tsai is Chief Executive Officer of Forcefield Therapeutics and an Executive Partner of Syncona Investment Management Ltd.
John manages organisational leadership and strategy as CEO of Forcefield Therapeutics. He is also an Executive Partner at Syncona Investment Management Ltd, where he supports the strategic execution of new and existing opportunities.
He brings 20 years’ leadership experience in bringing innovative therapies to market across the globe.
As President, Global Drug Development and Chief Medical officer at Novartis, John led the Company’s development portfolio for 4 years. Before joining Novartis, John was Chief Medical Officer and Senior Vice President of Global Medical Affairs at Amgen and spent 11 years at Bristol Myers Squibb, where he had roles in the Medical and Drug Development organizations.
A trained physician, John received his medical degree from the University of Louisville School of Medicine and a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from Washington University in St. Louis.
Maina Bhaman.
Board Director
Maina is a Partner in the Sofinnova Capital Strategy.
Maina joined Sofinnova Partners in 2018, bringing an extensive network and a long track record as a successful healthcare investor. Prior to joining Sofinnova, she was director of healthcare investment at Touchstone Innovations (formerly Imperial Innovations) in London, where she led and co-led investments in the UK.
Before turning to investing, Maina worked in the R&D teams of several UK and US biotech companies, including Celltech, Oxford GlycoSciences, Chimeric Therapies and GeneMedicine.
Maina holds a BSc from the University of Texas at Austin and an MBA from the Imperial Business School.
Sonia Hallen.
Board Director
Sonia is an Investment Manager at Gilde Healthcare, focusing on venture and growth capital investments in the therapeutic and healthtech sectors.
Prior to Gilde, Sonia was a Vice President at EQT Life Sciences (and formerly LSP) dedicated to the firm’s flagship therapeutics-focused venture funds. She held board positions on Evommune, ViCentra, and NOBI, and was heavily involved in numerous investments in private therapeutics and medtech companies. Prior to EQT, Sonia founded two start-ups, focused in digital health and infectious disease diagnostics. Before her entrepreneurial work, she was a strategy consultant within Accenture’s life sciences practice, based in the London office.
Sonia holds a BEng in Chemical Engineering from McGill University and an MSc in Biotechnology from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL). She completed her PhD with Dame Molly Stevens at Imperial College London, where she developed induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cell-based regenerative medicines.
Marco Boorsma.
Board Director
Marco is a General Partner at Forbion and joined the team in 2007.
He has a special interest in bringing his biotechnology, operations, business development, and investment experience from both small and large businesses to the portfolio, and to establish and manage new companies as part of Forbion’s build strategy. He was the founding CEO of VectorY Therapeutics and instrumental in the launch and financing of multiple “Forbion build” companies. He has served on the boards of several pre- and clinical-stage companies in Europe and North America, a number of which have been either acquired for over a billion bio-dollars or listed on Nasdaq.
Before joining Forbion, Marco was Business Development Director at DSM Pharmaceutical Products, managing biomanufacturing technologies and contract manufacturing projects, and he developed manufacturing processes for biosimilars at Cytos Biotechnology.
Marco has an MSc in Molecular Biology from the University of Groningen and holds a PhD in Biotechnology from the ETH Institute of Technology in Zürich, Switzerland.
Michael Kyriakides.
Board Director
Michael is a Partner of Syncona Investment Management Ltd.
Michael is a Director on the board of Purespring Therapeutics and an Observer to the board of Clade Therapeutics. He also supports Syncona portfolio company Freeline Therapeutics. Prior to joining Syncona, Michael worked in the life science practice of strategy consultancy L.E.K. Consulting in London, UK.
Michael received his Doctorate degree from the Department of Surgery and Cancer at Imperial College London. Michael also holds a Masters in Research in Biomedical Research, as well as a Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry.
Richard Francis.
Non-Executive Director
Richard Francis is the CEO of Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd.
He led Purespring Therapeutics as CEO from 2021 through to the end of 2022 and remains an active Board member.
Prior to this, Richard was the CEO of Sandoz, a global leader in generics and biosimilars. He was also a member of the Executive Committee of Novartis Sandoz.
Richard joined Novartis from Biogen Idec, where he was most recently Senior Vice President of US Commercial. Prior to this role and during his 13-year career at the company, he was the Head of Global Strategy and Marketing, Managing Director of Canada, and Managing Director of the UK & Ireland.
From 1998 to 2001, Richard was at Sanofi in the UK and held various marketing roles across the company’s urology, analgesics and cardiovascular products. He also held sales and marketing positions at Lorex Synthelabo and Wyeth.
Richard received a B.A. in Economics from Manchester Metropolitan University in the UK.
Julian Hanak.
Board Director and Chief Executive Officer
Julian is the CEO of Purespring Therapeutics.
Julian joined Purespring in June 2021 as Chief Development Officer before becoming CEO. He has worked in the biotechnology and biopharmaceutical sector for more than 25 years, holding senior leadership positions in small biotech, CDMO and large pharma companies.
Prior to Purespring, Julian worked at Biogen, where he was SVP and the global Head of Gene Therapy Product and Process Development. Before this, he was at Nightstar Therapeutics and Cobra Biologics, where he gained extensive gene therapy drug development, manufacturing, and business development experience.
Julian also held roles at Astra Zeneca and in research at the National Institute for Medical Research (MRC) and Bioproducts Laboratories. He holds a BSc (Hons) in Biochemistry from University College London and completed his MSc at Bangor University.
CAREERS
By bringing the power of gene therapy to the kidney, we aim to stop kidney diseases in their tracks, and to do it as soon as possible.
JOIN US
WHY JOIN PURESPRING THERAPEUTICS?
Patients are at the heart of all we do – we want to stop kidney diseases in their tracks to make a real difference to all patients.
We are at the cutting-edge of gene therapy, leveraging pioneering research to transform the treatment of kidney disease and actively seek out talent from all backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives to help fulfil our mission.
We believe that diversity and a rich internal culture builds scientific excellence and are guided by our strong company values that underpin our work as part of our ambition to creating a workforce that reflects the diversity of the world around us.
If you are interested in pursuing a career that could change outcomes for patients, please get in touch with us here: contact@purespringtx.com.
Purespring is committed to equality of opportunity for all staff and applications.
VACANCIES
