Jay Lichter

Dr. Lichter currently serves as the company’s president and CEO. Dr. Lichter, a biotechnology and pharmaceutical business executive, has over 20 years experience in management, scientific research and business development. Dr. Lichter has participated in licensing and M&A deals valued in excess of $1 billion. He is currently a managing director at Avalon Ventures and in that capacity is on the board of directors of Afraxis, Otonomy, Carolus, Zacharon, Incode and Akesis. He is an observer at Syndax board meetings. Until November 2008, Dr. Lichter served as president and CEO of Akesis Pharmaceuticals, a developer of patent protected diabetes drugs. He remains on the board of directors as executive chairman. In 2004, Dr. Lichter co-founded and served as vice president of operations at Sytera, Inc., a company that was acquired by Sirion Therapeutics, Inc. in July 2006.

Dr. Lichter has co-founded a number of other biotechnology companies, including Sequana Therapeutics, a genomics-base drug discovery company, and Xenopharm, a drug safety company. Dr. Lichter led negotiations in the development and management of collaborations with numerous pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies across many therapeutic areas. In 2000, Dr. Lichter co-founded and was CEO of Xenopharm, a drug safety company, where he drove the development of the company and its ultimate acquisition by Deltagen. He served in management positions at Sequenom, Pfizer and Genset. Dr. Lichter held postdoctoral positions at DuPont Merck Pharmaceutical Co. and Yale University. He received both his Ph.D. and B.S. at University of Illinois.