Leadership

Bill Symonds has served as the chief executive officer of Altavant Sciences since its inception in August 2018. Previously, Dr. Symonds was a member of the founding management team at Roivant Sciences, Inc. where he served as Roivant’s chief development officer.

In that role, Dr. Symonds crafted the research and development plans for a number of products including rodatristat ethyl, Altavant’s lead asset for the treatment of pulmonary arterial hypertension. Earlier in his career, Dr. Symonds held senior positions at a number of pharmaceutical companies including Pharmasset, Inc. and Gilead Sciences, Inc. During his tenure at Pharmasset, Dr. Symonds led the development of Sovaldi® for hepatitis C virus infection medicines. Based on the early success at Pharmasset, Dr. Symonds and his team were brought into Gilead after its acquisition of Pharmasset, where he continued to advance Sovaldi® through to FDA approval. Previously, he worked at GlaxoSmithKline and its predecessor companies on numerous approved medicines for HIV infection including Ziagen®, Agenerase® and Epzicom®.

Dr. Symonds received his Doctor of Pharmacy degree from Campbell University and completed a fellowship in clinical pharmacokinetics at the Clinical Pharmacokinetics Laboratory at Millard Fillmore Hospital in Buffalo, New York. He has authored or co-authored over 35 clinical articles and is named on nine patents related to the composition of matter and methods of use of drugs for hepatitis C infection.

Lyn Baranowski joined Altavant with 15+ years of experience spanning biotech, big pharma and venture capital firms. She has significant experience leading commercial, transactional, financing and strategic functions as well as cross-functional teams across a diversity of product portfolios and therapeutic areas.

Prior to Altavant, she served as senior vice president, corporate development & strategy at Melinta Therapeutics, Inc. where she helped guide the company through many corporate milestones including FDA approval of the company’s lead drug, a successful corporate public listing, and an acquisition of a key business unit from the Medicines Company. Prior to that role, Ms. Baranowski served as vice president of commercial development at Pearl Therapeutics which successfully developed a portfolio of COPD drugs prior to its sale to AstraZeneca for $1.15 Billion in 2013. She also worked as vice president of Vatera Healthcare, a healthcare-focused private equity / venture capital firm based in New York, and in a variety of business development, marketing and public affairs / policy roles with Novartis Pharmaceuticals.

She has an MBA from Harvard Business School and a BA from American University.

Larry Keller has served as vice president, clinical development at Altavant since August 2018. He joined Altavant from IQVIA where he was vice president, global strategic drug development and head of the Cardiovascular Center of Excellence.

Prior to IQVIA he held leadership positions in clinical R&D, medical affairs, established products, and regulatory strategy in companies including Pfizer, Kos Pharmaceuticals, Aldagen, and GlaxoSmithKline. He has focused on cardiovascular drug development and has experience in several other therapeutic areas including rare diseases such as pulmonary arterial hypertension among others.

Dr. Keller received his M.D. from The George Washington University and an M.S. in physiology from Georgetown University. He completed an internship and residency in pediatrics at The New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center and a fellowship in pediatric cardiology at Children’s Hospital of Michigan. He became board-certified in pediatrics and pediatric cardiology and is a fellow of the American College of Cardiology.

Mr. Bishop is vice president, strategic development and business operations at Altavant Sciences, Inc. Previously, he served in chief of staff roles at Altavant Sciences and Roivant Sciences. He joined Roivant in February 2017 from Teva Pharmaceuticals where he was director, portfolio and operations management for the personalized and predictive medicines and big data analytics group.

In the roles prior to Teva, Mr. Bishop was director of project management at Cabernet Pharmaceutical with a full-time consultant commitment to the Tailored Therapeutics group at Eli Lilly, he led the preclinical R&D efforts at Oxygen Biotherapeutics and was senior scientist in drug metabolism and pharmacokinetics at GlaxoSmithKline.

He has an MBA from Meredith College and BS in biochemistry from Pennsylvania State University.

Steve Wring joins Altavant Sciences from Roivant where he was the senior director, nonclinical drug disposition and modeling. Previously, he was the executive director of drug metabolism and pharmacokinetics for SCYNEXIS, Inc., with responsibility for the nonclinical development and clinical pharmacology of SCYNEXIS’ antifungal programs. Earlier responsibilities at SCYNEXIS included leadership roles in drug lead optimization and early development activities across multiple therapeutic indications for human and animal health.

Prior to joining SCYNEXIS in 2007, Dr. Wring was principal investigator of drug metabolism and pharmacokinetics at Trimeris Inc., where he led the nonclinical optimization of synthetic peptide and small molecule fusion inhibitors of HIV infection. Before joining Trimeris in 2002, he gained 11 years discovery and development experience with GSK, both in the UK and USA.

Dr. Wring received his PhD in analytical chemistry from the University of the West of England (Bristol, England) and has professional qualifications in clinical biochemistry and an MSc in instrumental analysis.