Chris Leahy is a dedicated and highly effective finance leader known for his reliability, expertise, and collaborative approach. As Executive Director, Finance and Corporate Controller at Marengo, he brings over 15 years of experience in finance and accounting within both public and private biotechnology companies. Chris joined Marengo from Kymera Therapeutics, where he served as Corporate Controller, following a successful career progression at Syros, OvaScience, and Agenus. He began his career in public accounting at Deloitte & Touche, supporting clients in biotechnology, consumer, and industrial products industries. A trusted and respected leader, Chris is pivotal in driving financial strategy and operational excellence at Marengo.
As Chief Development Officer of Marengo Therapeutics, Ke Liu joins Marengo with over 20 years of experience in the field of oncology, immuno-oncology, and cell and gene therapy, most recently serving as Senior Vice President and led the key regulatory activities at Sana Biotechnology. Prior to Sana, he spent more than 17 years working at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) where he held leadership roles at the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER), Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER), and the Oncology Center of Excellence (OCE). Ke has made major contributions to the field of Oncology and led the clinical evaluations and approvals of key first-in-class cancer therapeutics over the past decade, including checkpoint inhibitors, chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cells, T cell receptor (TCR) modified T cells, genome-edited products, neoantigen-based therapies, adoptive T cell therapies, oncolytic viral therapy, dendritic cell therapy, and combinations of these immune-oncologic therapeutics with checkpoint inhibitors and other agents.
Ke received his M.D. from Henan Medical University in China and his Ph.D. in molecular biology from Cornell University. He completed his internal medicine internship and residency at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, his medical oncology fellowship at the National Cancer Institute (NCI), and
additional cancer immunotherapy training at the NCI’s Surgery Branch. Ke is an internist and medical oncologist certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine.
As Chief Financial Officer for Marengo Therapeutics, Svetlana Makhni, brings more than 15 years of experience in finance, business development and operations in the biopharmaceutical industry. She previously served as Chief Financial Officer at Escient Pharmaceuticals, a clinical-stage biotech company, and before that, she was Chief Financial Officer and Head of Operations at Bierman ABA, a leading national, multi-site provider of behavioral health services. Prior to joining Bierman, she worked for nearly a decade in healthcare investment banking at several top financial institutions including BMO Capital Markets, Goldman Sachs, Westbrook Partners and the Blackstone Group.
Ms. Makhni earned her B.S. in Finance and Accounting from The Wharton School and her MBA from Harvard Business School.
Margaret, Vice President and Head of Quality at Marengo Therapeutics, brings our team an impressive thirty-three years of pharmaceutical and biotech experience. For the past twenty-nine years, she has been a dedicated advocate for quality, with a particular focus on GxP regulations. Her expertise has led to the successful development and implementation of quality strategies, ensuring our compliance. Margaret’s belief in tailored systems that meet our company’s needs is a testament to her understanding of our unique challenges and goals.
Over the past six years, Margaret has led GxP Quality for two early clinical phase biotech companies, overseeing the implementation of electronic quality management systems. She has supported these companies in non-clinical studies, GLP studies, clinical protocol development, GMP manufacturing and testing, and preparation of IND filings. Before her role at Marengo, Margaret served as Inspection Lead at Shire, managing site readiness for regulatory agency inspections. She also led compliance programs at Sanofi and managed audit and recall programs at Takeda.
Margaret earned her B.S. in Biology, specializing in microbiology and biotechnology. She has continued her education with business studies, completing the Harvard Manage Mentor series and QP coursework. Additionally, Margaret has completed Operational Excellence and Lean Six Sigma Green Belt programs. Margaret’s extensive experience and collaborative nature will lead the Marengo team to the next level of quality and compliance.
As Vice President, Clinical Development Operations at Marengo Therapeutics, Katie has 20 years of industry experience in the biotech and pharmaceutical industry with a particular focus in conducting oncology clinical trials. She has been responsible for leading and delivering on trial execution to gain regulatory approvals, along with global regulatory inspection experience. Katie was recently at Servier, overseeing an oncology portfolio and managing several programs in various stages of clinical development from the early to late phases to post-marketing. During her tenure at Servier, she was responsible for conducting pivotal studies in both hematologic and solid tumor malignancies with successful regulatory submissions and approvals. Prior to Servier, Katie was at Agios Pharmaceuticals as well as Ariad Pharmaceuticals, where she managed clinical oncology trials, which resulted in regulatory approvals in various indications.
Katie has a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a master’s degree of science in clinical research from the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences, where she currently serves as an advisor and an ad hoc guest speaker.
As CEO of Marengo Therapeutics and a director of the company’s board, Zhen Su brings nearly three decades of experience as a physician-scientist and biopharma executive, with expertise in building and leading both R&D and commercial organizations. During his tenure at Marengo, Zhen has led the team’s progressing the company’s lead asset into clinical trials, grown its leading-edge pipeline, and established a $2.8B strategic partnership with Ipsen. Zhen is also the Founding Chair for the Biotech Committee of the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC) and was recently appointed to the Board of Directors at Karyopharm Therapeutics Inc (NASDAQ: KPTI), CytomX Therapeutics (NASDAQ: CTMX) and Galvanize Therapeutics.
Prior to joining Marengo, Zhen served as Senior Vice President and Global Head of Oncology Business Francise for Merck KGaA, where he led the franchise’s turnaround to achieve double-digit organic growth and an annual revenue above $1B. In this role, he also successfully expanded the oncology portfolio including key alliance partnerships with Pfizer ($2.8B), GSK ($4.2B), and Debiopharm ($1.1B). In his earlier role as Chief Medical Officer of EMD Serono, he played an instrumental role in 8 major regulatory approvals across different therapeutic areas across Oncology and Neurology for Bavencio®, Tepmetko®, Erbitux®, and Mavenclad®. He also held leadership roles with increasing responsibilities at Sanofi Oncology for Taxotere® and Jevtana® and GlaxoSmithKline in Oncology, Respiratory and Urology.
Before his industry career, Zhen served on the faculty of Duke University Medical School as an Assistant Professor, where he led early clinical studies focusing on mRNA-based and cell-based immunotherapy in Oncology, and then the University of Florida, where he was the director of the Cell and Gene Therapy program. He is the author of more than 60 publications in immuno-oncology and targeted oncology.
Zhen earned his M.D. from the Technical University of Dresden, completed his post-doctoral training in Cancer Immunotherapy at Duke University Medical Center, and received an MBA from the University of Toronto.
As Senior Strategic Advisor to Marengo Therapeutics, Dr. Chabner brings decades of extensive experience pioneering key research in the field of cancer drug discovery and development. In addition to his role at Marengo, he is an Allen Distinguished Investigator, Clinical Director Emeritus for the Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center, and a Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. During his career at the National Cancer Institute, he served as a Senior Investigator in the Laboratory of Chemical Pharmacology, Chief of the Clinical Pharmacology Branch, Director of the Clinical Oncology Program, and Director of the Division of Cancer Treatment. At the NCI, he maintained an active laboratory program in cancer pharmacology, where he led the development of the breast cancer drug Taxol. His research contributed significantly to the development of high dose chemotherapy regimens, and to standard therapies for lymphoma. Dr. Chabner is a senior editor for The Oncologist and in 2006, he received a presidential appointment to the National Cancer Advisory Board at the NCI.
Dr. Chabner received his M.D. from Harvard Medical School.
Dr Elena Garralda is a Medical Oncologist, Principal Investigator and Researcher. Currently the Director of Early Drug Development and Co-director of the Clinical Research Program at VHIO. Dedicated to translational research, she coordinates the phase I program and the clinical research program, where complex clinical trials with drugs in early development (phase I and early phase II) focus on targeted agents and immunotherapies, with special emphasis in cell signaling, cancer stem cells, immuno-oncology and first-in-human studies of targeted therapies, rational combinations, and biomarker-driven trials. Dr Garralda is chair of ESMO’s Early Drug Development Track, member of ENA’s Scientific Committee, faculty of the “Methods in Clinical Cancer Research” annual workshop, chair of EORTC’s RECIST Task Force and the Clinical Trials leader for the Cancer Core Europe Consortium among other working groups and associations. She has authored over 100 articles published in peer-reviewed journals including Journal of Clinical Oncology, Nature Medicine and New England Journal of Medicine, has presented more than 150 abstracts and posters in international congresses as AACR, ESMO, ASCO, TAT or ENA, and serves as reviewer for JAMA Oncology, Annals of Oncology, Cancer Treatment Reviews, British Journal of Cancer, Clinical Cancer Research, Lancet Oncology, Nature Reviews or ESMO Open among others.
Dr. E. John Wherry is the Chair of the Department of Systems Pharmacology and Translational Therapeutics in the Perelman School of Medicine, Director of the UPenn Institute for Immunology, and the Barbara and Richard Schiffrin President’s Distinguished Professor. He has helped pioneer the field of T cell exhaustion, assisting in identifying the role of the “checkpoint” molecule PD-1 and others for reinvigoration of exhausted T cells in cancer and defining the underlying molecular and epigenetic mechanisms of exhausted T cells. He has received numerous honors in his career, including the Distinguished Alumni award from the Thomas Jefferson University, the Cancer Research Institute’s Frederick W. Alt Award for New Discoveries in Immunology, and the Stanley N. Cohen Biomedical Research Award from the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine. Dr. Wherry received his PhD from Thomas Jefferson University.
Dr. Lillian Siu has over 20 years of experience as a senior medical oncologist at Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, as well as experience as a Professor of Medicine at the University of Toronto. Dr. Siu’s main research focus is in precision oncology, biomarkers especially circulating tumor DNA and clinical trials methodology. She is the Director of the Phase I Program, Co-Director of the Bras and Family Drug Development Program, and Clinical Lead for the Tumor Immunotherapy Program at Princess Margaret Cancer Centre. Dr. Siu is currently the Editor-in-Chief for American Association for Cancer Research’s newest journal Cancer Research Communications. She is also a scientific editor for Cancer Discovery and is on the editorial board for JAMA Oncology, Cell and Cancer Cell. Dr. Siu earned her MD from the University of Toronto.