Achaogen, Inc. announced the promotions of Blake Wise to President and Chief Operating Officer, Lee Swem, Ph.D., to Senior Vice President and Chief Scientific Officer and Zeryn Sarpangal to Senior Vice President of Corporate and People Strategy. Blake Wise has been appointed President and Chief Operating Officer. He joined Achaogen in 2015 as Achaogen’s Chief Operating Officer. In his expanded role, Mr. Wise will oversee commercialization, technical operations, corporate development, investor relations, corporate communications and human resources. Dr. Lee Swem has been promoted to Senior Vice President and Chief Scientific Officer. He joined Achaogen in 2013 as the Director of the Therapeutic Antibody Program, where he developed a state-of-the-art antibody discovery platform to rapidly identify rare functional antibodies to treat serious human infectious diseases. In 2015, he was appointed Vice President, Head of Research. Prior to Achaogen, Dr. Swem was a Scientist in the Department of Infectious Disease at Genentech where he developed programs in anti-influenza A and B, and began a small molecule anti-bacterial program. Zeryn Sarpangal has been promoted to Senior Vice President of Corporate and People Strategy. In this role, she will oversee human resources along with key aspects of corporate strategy, alliance management and non-dilutive funding. Ms. Sarpangal has been at Achaogen for more than six years and has held various roles in the organization including Sr. Director of Finance & Operations and Director of Strategic Marketing. In 2015, she was promoted to Vice President of Human Resources and Corporate Affairs.
Achaogen, Inc. is a late-stage biopharmaceutical company. The Company is engaged in the discovery, development and commercialization of antibacterial treatments against multi-drug resistant (MDR) gram-negative infections. The Company is involved in researching and developing plazomicin, its lead product candidate, for the treatment of serious bacterial infections, including complicated urinary tract infection (cUTI), blood stream infections and other infections due to MDR Enterobacteriaceae, including carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE). Plazomicin is an intravenous aminoglycoside antibiotic. The Company has developed plazomicin by chemically modifying sisomicin, a naturally occurring aminoglycoside, in order to overcome common aminoglycoside resistance mechanisms. The Company has a portfolio of small molecule and antibody programs. The Company's Early Development programs include C-Scape and LpxC.
ACHAOGEN