San Diego, Ca., USA - May 7, 2014, San Diego, Ca., USA - Arcturus Therapeutics, Inc., a RNA medicines company pursuing rare diseases, announced the appointment of Robert Baltera and Stuart Collinson to its board of directors.
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Mr. Baltera is a seasoned pharmaceutical executive with vast business and product management experience. He was the CEO of Amira Pharmaceuticals, Inc., which was acquired by Bristol-Myers Squibb Company.
Before becoming Amira's CEO, Mr. Baltera worked for 17 years at Amgen Inc., during which time he held a number of senior management positions, the last being vice president of corporate and contract manufacturing. Bob successfully served as the team leader responsible for the approval of Kineret in rheumatoid arthritis.
He serves in senior roles in several organizations, including Board of Directors at Organovo Holdings Inc., Xencor, Inc., Panmira Pharmaceuticals, LLC, and San Diego Venture Group. He is also a Trustee of the Keck Graduate Institute, Business Advisory panel member of PBS Biotech, Inc. and Executive Chairman at Adheron Therapeutics, Inc.
Mr. Baltera has an M.B.A. from Anderson School at UCLA and earned his B.S. in microbiology and M.S. in genetics from The Pennsylvania State University.
Dr. Collinson is a partner at Forward Ventures and also the Executive Chairman of Tioga Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Previously he was Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President of Aurora Biosciences Corp. (acquired by Vertex Pharmaceuticals Inc.). Before Aurora, Dr. Collinson was Chief Executive Officer of Andaris Limited (acquired by Quadrant, now part of Perrigo).
He held senior management positions at GlaxoWellcome plc (now GlaxoSmithKline plc) and Baxter International Inc., and was a consultant with The Boston Consulting Group.
He was previously a director of Affinium Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (acquired by Debiopharma Group), Cabrellis Pharmaceuticals Corp. (acquired by Pharmion Corp., now part of Celgene Corp.), Conforma Therapeutics Corp. (acquired by BiogenIdec, Inc.), GeneOhm Sciences, Inc. (acquired by Becton, Dickinson and Company), NovaCardia, Inc. (acquired by Merck & Co, Inc.), and Proprius Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (acquired by Cypress Bioscience, Inc.), and Vertex Pharmaceuticals Inc. ■