About Us

Engrail Therapeutics is a clinical-stage pharmaceutical company founded in 2019 with the aspiration of becoming a leader in neuroscience. We are committed to rapidly advancing our innovative, precision-targeted therapeutics.

Our purpose is to deliver transformational therapies to improve the lives of patients with devastating neuropsychiatric and neurodevelopmental disorders.

Vikram Sudarsan, PhD

President and Chief Executive Officer

Vikram is a neuroscientist, investor, entrepreneur, and industry veteran with nearly 25 years of industry experience. Most recently, Vikram was CEO of Cipla Technologies and built a pipeline of branded products to treat CNS disorders and respiratory diseases. Prior to that, Vikram was head of Strategy for Cipla New Ventures. Vikram’s career experience spans a wide spectrum of industry functions, including venture capital, business development, transactions, market access, drug idea generation, drug development, and operations. Vikram served on the boards of Stempeutics, Chase Pharmaceuticals, Cipla Technologies, and Cipla USA. Vikram received his PhD from the University of Sheffield and completed his post-doctorate at Stanford University School of Medicine.

Kimberly Vanover, PhD

Chief Scientific Officer

Kimberly is a highly accomplished neuropsychiatric and neurodegenerative drug discoverer and developer with over 25 years of industry experience. Most recently, Kimberly served as SVP, Clinical Development and SVP, Early-Stage Clinical Development and Translational Medicine at Intra-Cellular Therapies, guiding Caplyta (lumateperone) from early development to approval. Prior to Intra-Cellular, Kimberly worked at Acadia Pharmaceuticals, playing a key role in the development of Nuplazid (pimavanserin). Kimberly received her PhD in Biopsychology from the University of Chicago and completed her postdoctoral training at the University of California – San Diego and Lederle Laboratories.

Quentin McCubbin, PhD

Chief Technical Officer

Quentin has over 25 years of experience supporting biotech and pharma in various roles of progressing responsibility and across diverse therapeutic areas. In his early career, he headed up process chemistry for two biotech start-ups in the UK. He then spent 19 years at Takeda Oncology (originally Millenium Pharmaceuticals), first leading Process Chemistry & Formulation and then as the Vice President of Pharmaceutical Sciences, responsible for Drug Substance, Drug Product, Analytical Development, Clinical Supply, and Quality Operations. During this time, he supported four global NDA/CTA/BLA approvals (Adcetris™, Entyvio™, Ninlaro™, and Relumina™) and worked across multiple therapeutic areas including oncology, neurology, gastroenterology, and inflammation.

In 2019, he joined Cerevel Therapeutics as the Head of Technical Operations and Facilities, where he oversaw technology transfer from Pfizer and developed supply strategy and initial regulatory filings (module 3) for the product portfolio. He then joined Frequency Therapeutics in 2021 as Chief Manufacturing Officer, where he oversaw technical operations to lead overall efforts in Drug Product Formulation, Chemistry Manufacturing and Controls (CMC), and Supply Chain. He also acted as the alliance manager for their hearing program with the partner company Astellas.

His academic career focused on organic chemistry, culminating in a BSc (with honors) and PhD from Monash University in Melbourne, Australia and a post-doctoral fellowship at Imperial College in London.

Eve Taylor, PhD

Sr. VP, Clinical Development

Eve has over 20 years of industry experience with a specific focus on neuroscience clinical development and operations. Most recently, Eve helped lead early-stage clinical development at Intra-Cellular Therapies. Previously, Eve led clinical development activities at Cytori Therapeutics, Ceregene, and Acadia Pharmaceuticals. Eve has also served as founder and lead at Taylored BioConsulting, providing clinical development and other consulting services. Eve received her BSc (Hons) from the University of Western Australia, PhD in Biochemistry from King’s College London, and completed her postdoctoral training at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies and University of California – San Diego.

Bill Brubaker, PhD

Sr. VP, Nonclinical Development

Bill is a highly sought-after non-clinical development expert and entrepreneur with over 35 years of industry experience leading teams and diverse programs to successful outcomes.   As President of Farmington Pharma Development, a consulting service he founded in 2004, he has led dozens of clients’ programs from early-stage discovery through successful IND filings and beyond.  More recently, he served as Nayan Pharmaceutical’s Head of Non-clinical Development; Project Leader and MedChem Director for Ultragenyx Pharmaceutical‘s creatine transporter disorder program; and, as acting CEO, he led Bikam Pharmaceuticals to a successful acquisition by Shire.  Bill received his PhD in Chemistry from Virginia Tech and completed his postdoctoral training at Yale University School of Medicine.

Rex E. Bosen, CPA

Acting Chief Financial Officer

Rex has over 30 years of experience in public and corporate accounting and finance. Rex’s corporate career includes a variety of progressive roles, including CFO at Hocking International Laboratories, LLC; SVP, Finance and Accounting at Provide Commerce, Inc., and Proflowers, Inc.; CFO and founder at PhatPipe, Inc., and Controller at EG Electro-Graph, Inc. Rex has direct experience in the preparation and successful placement of an IPO along with several corporate acquisition and sale transactions. Rex also had a successful tax and consulting practice as a sole practitioner. Rex received his Master of Accountancy from Brigham Young University.

Estibaliz Arce, PhD

VP, Translational Science & Clinical Development

Estibaliz Arce is a licensed clinical psychologist specializing in neurocognition and neuroimaging, with more than 20 years of experience in the academic and biotech/pharmaceutical sectors.

Esti completed her BSc and PhD in clinical psychology at Universidad de Deusto, Spain. She came to the United States to complete a clinical psychiatry internship at Crownsville State Hospital (MD) as well as her dissertation at USC (CA). Following the completion of her doctorate, she pursued postdoctoral fellowships at UCLA and UCSD, where she focused on clinical/neuropsychological evaluations and treatment for psychotic and affective disorders, as well as understanding the neural underpinnings of cognitive and emotional processes in several psychiatric populations using fMRI.

Following her academic training, Esti has held several clinical and translational research positions at Wyeth, EMD Serono, Pfizer, and Biogen, contributing to the development of treatments for multiple sclerosis, schizophrenia, and depression, among other CNS indications. 

Camilla Gomiero

VP, Commercial Strategy & Business Development

Camilla has over 10 years of industry experience advising companies on commercial launch strategies, conducting early-stage asset valuations, and leading commercial due diligence as a consultant focused on the life sciences. Camilla has worked with key stakeholders within industry to identify and communicate the commercial potential for new treatments across multiple therapy areas and stages of development, with recent expertise in orphan drugs and neurosciences. Camilla previously held positions as Engagement Manager and Consultant with Two Labs, IMS Health and ICON. While at IMS, Camilla helped establish IMS Health Capital, an investment banking company.

Anil Vootkur, PharmD

VP, Corporate Development

Anil has over 20 years of industry experience with demonstrated success in corporate strategy, business development, global and regional in-line and upstream marketing, as well as medical affairs and communications. Prior to joining Engrail, Anil spent several years in corporate strategy as well as leading neurosciences global strategic marketing at Allergan. Prior to Allergan, Anil worked in a variety of progressive leadership positions across functions at Takeda, including commercial strategy and execution, business development, and medical strategy. Anil has also served as founder and principal of ARINA LifeSciencesConsulting. Anil received his Doctorate in Pharmacy from the University of Illinois – Chicago.

Peter Bisgaard

Chairman of the Board

Managing Director, Pivotal Life Sciences
Managing General Partner, Pivotal bioVenture Partners

Peter Bisgaard has served as the Chairman of our board of directors since June 2019. Since 2017, Mr. Bisgaard has served as Managing Director of Pivotal Life Sciences. Pivotal Life Sciences is an investment platform that specializes in providing capital to innovative private and public companies developing therapeutic products and technologies to address major unmet medical needs. He was previously a Senior Partner at Novo Ventures (US) Inc. since 2009. As part of Novo’s senior team, he was responsible for Novo Ventures’ overall investment and portfolio strategy as well as the ongoing development of the Novo Ventures team in the US. Prior to that, Mr. Bisgaard was with Novo Ventures since 2001 in Denmark. He has both investment and board experience from a number of private and public US life sciences companies. Prior to joining Novo Ventures, Peter was with McKinsey & Co. as a general consultant and as a specialist within the Scandinavian Corporate Finance and Strategy Group. He was part of the strategic and financial advisory teams in multiple large Private Equity and Corporate M&A transactions and strategy projects across industry sectors.

Mr. Bisgaard obtained an M.Sc. in Engineering in 1998 from the Technical University of Denmark and was awarded a post-graduate degree in Mathematical Modelling in Economics by the European Consortium for Mathematics in the Industry.

Tiba Aynechi, PhD

Board Member

General Partner, Norwest Venture Partners

Tiba Aynechi is a General Partner of Norwest Venture Partners, where she leads the biotech practice within the healthcare team. Prior to joining Norwest, Tiba was a Senior Partner at Novo Holdings A/S, one of the top life sciences investment firms, with offices in the US and Europe. She has served on various public and private boards including iRhythm Technologies, Mirum Pharmaceuticals, Nkarta Therapeutics, Arcellx, Spruce Biosciences, and MDLive. Earlier in her career Tiba was a banker focused on M&A, licensing, and financing transactions involving biotech/pharma. Tiba attended the University of California Irvine, where she received a Bachelor of Science degree in physics with a biomedical concentration. She holds a PhD in biophysics from the University of California San Francisco, where she also did her postdoctoral fellowship. Tiba is also a published author of scientific articles and book chapters in rational drug design.

Jasper Bos, PhD

Board Member

General Partner, Forbion

Jasper currently serves as General Partner for the Growth Fund at Forbion. He was previously Senior Vice President and Managing Director at M Ventures, the venture arm of Merck, where he led a team with a fund size of €400 million invested over more than 50 biotech, life science tools, and tech companies. His investment activities ranged from seed-stage to cross-over and IPO. Jasper also has operational experience in portfolio companies and helped create multiple successful spin-out companies from Merck. He received his PhD in Pharmacy from the University of Groningen in the Netherlands.

Heath Lukatch, PhD

Board Member

Co-Founder and Managing Partner, Red Tree Venture Capital

Heath Lukatch has extensive experience with investing in the life science industry, with 38 career investments. He is currently Managing Partner and Co-founder of Red Tree Venture Capital. Previously, he served as Partner, Managing Director and Life Sciences Investment Team Leader at TPG, Co-founder of Novo Ventures’ San Francisco office, and Managing Director at Piper Jaffray Ventures and SightLine Partners. Currently, Heath serves as board chair of Acrigen Biosciences and Magnus Medical; is a board member at Bicara Therapeutics, Excellergy Therapeutics, and Vaxcyte (PCVX); and is a board observer at Ceribell. He also has experience as a strategy consultant and bench scientist. Heath received his BA in Biochemistry from the University of California at Berkeley and PhD in Neuroscience from Stanford University.

Karoly Nikolich, PhD

Board Member

Venture Partner, Pivotal bioVenture Partners

Karoly Nikolich is a member of the Board of Directors of Engrail Therapeutics. During the 1980s, he led Genentech’s entry into neuroscience and led and participated in the development of numerous protein therapeutics. He was Vice President of Research at Lynx Therapeutics, co-founder of AGY Therapeutics, Amnestix, Neurofluidics, Chase Pharmaceuticals, Circuit Therapeutics, and Alkahest. He has also served as a venture partner with Pivotal BioVentures and has been on the boards and scientific advisory boards of a number of neurotherapeutics and biotech companies. He currently serves as Chair on the Board of Directors at Alkahest, a Grifols company. He has been an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at Stanford University Medical School. Dr. Nikolich is a graduate of Eotvos University in Budapest and worked as a postdoctoral fellow at Tulane University and UCSF before joining Genentech.

Niall O’Donnell, PhD

Board Member

Managing Director, RiverVest

Niall is currently Managing Director at RiverVest, where he focuses on biopharmaceutical opportunities. He has also served as a board member for multiple pharmaceutical companies, including Reneo Pharmaceuticals, Avalyn Pharma, Glycomine, Sparrow Pharmaceuticals, and Spruce Biosciences. Niall is also the co-founder of Reneo Pharmaceutical, where he served as interim CEO, and Excaliard Pharmaceuticals, Inc. His career experience includes serving as the interim Chief Medical Officer at Lumena Pharmaceuticals and as an immunologist at Johnson & Johnson Pharmaceutical Research and Development. Niall received a PhD in Biochemistry from the University of Dundee, an MA in Biochemistry from Pembroke College, and an MBA from Rady School of Management of the University of California.

Vikram Sudarsan, PhD

Board Member

President and Chief Executive Officer, Engrail Therapeutics

Vikram is a neuroscientist, investor, entrepreneur, and industry veteran with nearly 25 years of industry experience. Most recently, Vikram was CEO of Cipla Technologies and built a pipeline of branded products to treat CNS disorders and respiratory diseases. Prior to that, Vikram was head of Strategy for Cipla New Ventures. Vikram’s career experience spans a wide spectrum of industry functions, including venture capital, business development, transactions, market access, drug idea generation, drug development, and operations. Vikram served on the boards of Stempeutics, Chase Pharmaceuticals, Cipla Technologies, and Cipla USA. Vikram received his PhD from the University of Sheffield and completed his post-doctorate at Stanford University School of Medicine.

Stacie Weninger, PhD

Board Member

President, F-Prime Biomedical Research Initiative

Stacie Weninger currently serves as President of FBRI and as a Venture Partner with F-Prime Capital. Previously she held pivotal roles as Senior Director of Science Programs for the Fidelity Foundations, a Senior Scientist at Cell Press for Neuron, and as the Project Manager and Senior Analyst for the Task Force on Women in Science at Harvard University. She chairs the Collaboration for Alzheimer’s Prevention, is a member of the World Dementia Council, and is the CEO and Chairman of the Board of Directors for Rugen Therapeutics. In addition, she serves as a member of numerous other external and scientific advisory boards including as a member of the Board of Directors for Atalanta, Sironax, TargetALS, and the Governance Committee for the Targets to Therapies (T2T) MJFF collaborative initiative. She previously served as the President of Alzforum and was a founding member of the Board of Directors for multiple companies including Denali Therapeutics, Neumora, and Annexon. Stacie received a BS in chemistry from the University of North Carolina and a PhD in Neuroscience from Harvard University.

Stephen Cunningham, MD, FRCP, FFPM

Board Member

EVP, Research & Development and Chief Development Officer, Engrail Therapeutics

Stephen is an experienced pharmaceutical executive with 30 years of expertise leading the development, approval, launch, and lifecycle management of blockbuster drugs across multiple therapeutic areas. Prior to cofounding Engrail Therapeutics, Stephen gained broad portfolio experience at Zeneca and AstraZeneca. After 12 years at Zeneca/AstraZeneca, he spent 13 years at Novartis in the US as CSO and head of clinical development and medical affairs. Most recently, Stephen served as a key advisor to Chase Pharmaceuticals, Cipla Technologies, and Pharmascience on the development of portfolios that led to high-value acquisitions. Stephen has extensive experience in the development of drugs in the neuroscience area and received his MD from Queen’s University Belfast.

Tony Ho, MD, PhD

Independent Board Member

Former EVP R&D, CRISPR Therapeutics

Dr. Tony Ho currently serves as a member of the Board of Directors at Engrail Therapeutics. Most recently, Dr. Ho served as Executive Vice President and Head of R&D at CRISPR Therapeutics. Tony was previously SVP and Head of Oncology Integration and Innovation at AstraZeneca. He oversaw both the development and commercialization of Lynparza and Imfinizi. Prior to joining AstraZeneca, Tony was the Neurology and Ophthalmology Clinical Section Head at Merck and led multiple development programs, including the approval of Maxalt for pediatric migraine and Zioptan for glaucoma. Prior to joining Merck, Tony was the Co-Founder and CSO of Neuronyx, a regenerative medicine company. Tony received a BS from UCLA and an MD from Johns Hopkins University. He was Assistant Neurology Professor at Hopkins. Tony described and elucidated the pathogenesis of acute motor axonal neuropathy (AMAN). He has published widely with over 80 papers and is a co-inventor of 14 patents. Tony is currently an adjunct Associate Professor of Neurology at the University of Pennsylvania and Assistant Professor (Part-time) of Neurology at Johns Hopkins University.

Jordi Serrats, PhD

VP, Preclinical Development & Neurobiology

Jordi is a renowned neurobiologist with nearly 20 years of neuroscience research and industry experience. Most recently, Jordi led the neurodevelopmental disorders biotech unit of Takeda and was a major contributor to the design and progression of its novel drug discovery portfolio. Prior to his tenure at Takeda, Jordi made significant contributions to the neuroinflammation unit at Lundbeck. Jordi received his PhD from the University of Barcelona (focus on the serotonergic system) and completed his postdoctoral studies in neuroinflammation at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies under the mentorship of Dr. Paul Sawchenko.

Stephen Cunningham, MD, FRCP, FFPM

EVP, Research & Development and Chief Development Officer

Stephen is an experienced pharmaceutical executive with 30 years of expertise leading the development, approval, launch, and lifecycle management of blockbuster drugs across multiple therapeutic areas. Prior to cofounding Engrail Therapeutics, Stephen gained broad portfolio experience at Zeneca and AstraZeneca. After 12 years at Zeneca/AstraZeneca, he spent 13 years at Novartis in the US as CSO and head of clinical development and medical affairs. Most recently, Stephen served as a key advisor to Chase Pharmaceuticals, Cipla Technologies, and Pharmascience on the development of portfolios that led to high-value acquisitions. Stephen has extensive experience in the development of drugs in the neuroscience area and received his MD from Queen’s University Belfast.