Bill Gerhart

Bill Gerhart has more than 25 years of experience starting, financing, and building companies based on promising technologies. Prior to Respivant, Mr. Gerhart was a founder and the CEO of Patara Pharma, which pursued the initial development of RVT-1601. Prior to Patara, he was the President & CEO of Elevation Pharmaceuticals, a San Diego-based biotech he founded in 2008 that developed a new inhaled therapy for patients with severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Elevation was acquired in 2012 by Sunovion, a subsidiary of Dainippon Sumitomo Pharma, and in 2017, the FDA approved this new therapy, marketed as Lonhala™ Magnair™, the first nebulized LAMA for COPD patients. Prior to Elevation, Mr. Gerhart was the President and CEO of Mpex Pharmaceuticals from 2002 to 2007, a company he founded to discover and develop new antibacterials for the treatment of serious infections including Quinsair®, an inhaled antibiotic, now approved in Europe and Canada for the treatment of cystic fibrosis. Mr. Gerhart is a member of the Board of Trustees at the Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute and a member of YPO. He received his M.B.A. from Harvard Business School and his B.B.A. degree from Baylor University.