It’s a seismic day for Tectonic Therapeutic as the biotech nabs the program manager for Regeneron’s blockbuster asthma drug Dupixent as chief medical officer.
Marcella Ruddy, M.D., joins the pre-clinical biotech after leading the immunology and inflammation development pipeline at Regeneron as vice president for the global program. Ruddy guided Dupixent through “numerous approvals and initiations of many phase 3” trials across the U.S. and the world, Tectonic said.
Dupixent, which Regeneron developed in partnership with Sanofi, has become a blockbuster therapy, with analysts expecting sales to reach about $12.5 billion. Both Sanofi and Regeneron recorded $4 billion in sales for 2020.
Ruddy’s experience working on Dupixent will be a boon to the leadership team at Tectonic, which already includes a C-suite of people behind other best-sellers Entresto, Keytruda and Praluent. The biologics biotech is going after unexplored and undruggable G-protein-coupled receptors.
“Her deep experience in all stages of drug development as well as her demonstrated expertise in building and leading clinical development teams will be invaluable as Tectonic prepares to nominate a first drug development candidate for clinical studies,” said Alise Reicin, M.D., Tectonic president and CEO, in a statement.
Tectonic also made a key hire in May, a month after an $80 million series A, by snagging Peter McNamara, Ph.D., as head of research. He previously led biotech and biotherapeutics for Novartis’ Genomics Institute.