PR Newswire, San Diego, August 1, 2019 – Viracta Therapeutics, Inc. announced today that it has appointed Dan Chevallard as Chief Financial Officer and Xiaohu Deng, Ph.D. as Senior Vice President of Product Development. Mr. Chevallard brings important financial and operational experience to Viracta and will lead the Company’s finance functions. Dr. Deng brings significant product development and chemical manufacturing and controls (CMC) experience to Viracta and will oversee its investigational drug product development activities.
“We are thrilled to welcome Dan and Xiaohu to the Viracta team,” said Ivor Royston, MD, Viracta’s CEO. “Their proven track record and expertise in finance and product development will be critical as we continue to grow and advance our nanatinostat/valganciclovir combination toward registration trials and expand development to additional indications and geographies.”
Mr. Chevallard joins Viracta from Regulus Therapeutics Inc. where he held various key positions including Chief Financial Officer, Vice President, Finance and Accounting and Vice President, Accounting and Financial Reporting. At Regulus, Mr. Chevallard led the finance and operations teams, played a key role in the execution of $270M in equity and growth capital financings, and implemented all integrated finance functions. Prior to Regulus, Mr. Chevallard spent seven years at Prometheus Laboratories Inc. (acquired by Nestlé Health Science) where he held senior roles in corporate finance. Prior to joining industry, Mr. Chevallard spent five years in public accounting at Ernst & Young, LLP. Mr. Chevallard has a Bachelor of Accountancy from the University of San Diego and is a Certified Public Accountant in California.
Dr. Deng joins Viracta from Kura Oncology, Inc. and Wellspring Biosciences, where he was Senior Director, Head of CMC. Dr. Deng led the CMC function - including development, manufacture, quality control, and clinical supply - of multiple programs through various phases of development (I, II and III and registrational). Prior to Kura, Dr. Deng spent thirteen years at Janssen Pharmaceutical Companies of Johnson & Johnson in various roles of increasing responsibility associated with process chemistry R&D, CRO management, and project management of discovery/preclinical development. He has more than 30 peer-reviewed journal publications, a book chapter and 14 issued patents to his credit. Dr. Deng holds a Ph.D. in organic chemistry from Emory University and MS and BS in chemistry from Fudan University.
Viracta is a clinical-stage drug development company focused on advancing novel epigenetic therapeutics derived from its proprietary Kick & Kill therapeutic approach to benefit patients with viral-associated cancers and other serious diseases. Viracta has entered into partnerships with Shenzhen Salubris Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. to bring treatments for EBV-associated cancers to China, and with NantKwest, Inc. to utilize nanatinostat in combination with their clinical-stage Natural Killer (NK) cell immunotherapy. Viracta plans to enter into additional geographic and combination therapy partnerships.
For additional information please visit www.viracta.com.
Amy Conrad
Juniper Point
amy@juniper-point.com
858-366-3243