Synthorx Expands Leadership Team with Three Key Hires

SAN DIEGO, July 12, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Synthorx, Inc., a biotechnology company using synthetic biology to discover and develop novel protein therapeutics, announced today the appointment of three key members to its management team. The new appointments are: Enoch Kariuki, Pharm.D., Senior Vice President, Corporate Development; Christian V. Kuhlen, J.D., M.D., General Counsel; and Charles M. Winter, Vice President, Chemistry, Manufacturing, and Controls (CMC). Each person brings years of valuable life science industry experience in strategy and financing, legal and corporate governance, and biologic manufacturing, respectively. 

"We are pleased to add these talented individuals – each with an impressive track record of leadership and significant accomplishments and experience – to our team," said Laura Shawver, Ph.D., President, CEO, and Director of Synthorx. "We believe each of them will be important to Synthorx as we advance our pipeline of Synthorin™ cytokines, including Synthorin IL-2, and pursue our goal of demonstrating that our technology can create tailored medicines that offer improvements over current treatments with the ability to help people with serious diseases."

Dr. Enoch Kariuki has significant experience in healthcare strategy, business development, and financing. He was most recently Vice President at H.I.G. Capital, where he focused on investments in life sciences companies. His previous roles include Senior Associate at Leerink Partners and Associate Director at UBS Investment Bank. At Leerink and UBS, Dr. Kariuki advised healthcare companies on equity capital financings, mergers and acquisitions, leveraged buyouts, and recapitalizations. Dr. Kariuki did a Post-Doctoral Fellowship in R&D strategy at Bristol-Myers Squibb and was a Pharmacist at CVS Caremark. He holds an MBA from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth and a Pharm.D. from Texas Southern University.

Dr. Christian V. Kuhlen has a depth and breadth of expertise as General Counsel for biotechnology companies, where he has been responsible for legal, SEC, human resources, intellectual property, and corporate governance functions. He has successfully managed a wide variety of financial transactions, including private financings, an initial public offering, and numerous follow-on offerings. Most recently, Dr. Kuhlen served as General Counsel and Secretary for Ignyta, Inc., where he coordinated two public financings and advised on the company's acquisition by Roche. Before Ignyta, Dr. Kuhlen served as General Counsel, Vice President, and Corporate Secretary of Genoptix, Inc., where he led the legal and corporate governance functions from its initial public offering to its successful acquisition by Novartis. Prior to Genoptix, he was an attorney in private practice with Cooley LLP. Dr. Kuhlen holds a B.S. in biochemistry and cell biology and a B.A. in economics from the University of California, San Diego, and a M.D. and J.D. from the University of Southern California.

Mr. Charles M. Winter has deep experience in advancing biologic manufacturing in all phases of the drug development pipeline, as well as important expertise in managing U.S. and ex-U.S. regulatory interactions. Prior to Synthorx, he was Head of Biologics CMC for the Denali Therapeutics pipeline. Before joining Denali, Mr. Winter was Vice President, Manufacturing and Technology at JHL Biotech, where he executed strategic deals for developing and manufacturing biologics in Taiwan and China. Previously at Gilead and at Genentech, Mr. Winter was a core member of a start-up team for a new GMP facility and developed processes for multiple investigational new drug applications. Mr. Winter received a B.S. in chemical engineering from University of Wisconsin-Madison.     

About Synthorx

Synthorx, Inc. is a biotechnology company using synthetic biology to discover and develop novel protein therapeutics. Synthorx's expanded genetic alphabet platform has the ability to drive the site-specific incorporation of multiple synthetic amino acids into proteins, thereby tuning receptor specificity important for improving efficacy and safety. In addition, the company's engineered organisms provide the ability to manufacture these improved proteins, called Synthorins, with the required fidelity and yield. The Synthorx platform expands the chemical and structural repertoire of protein therapeutics and uncovers new ways to modulate pharmacological properties of biologics. The company was founded based on important discoveries in Dr. Floyd Romesberg's lab at The Scripps Research Institute in conjunction with Avalon Ventures. The company is headquartered in La Jolla, Calif.

For more information, please visit www.synthorx.com and follow on Twitter @synthorx.

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SOURCE Synthorx Inc.