Exagen Inc. Expands Board of Directors with Its Appointment of Chet Burrell, Tina Nova and Bruce Robertson
July 30, 2019 at 08:51 am EDT
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Exagen Inc. announced the appointment of three new members to its Board of Directors: Chet Burrell, Tina Nova and Bruce Robertson. Chet Burrell has held numerous CEO level positions and chairmanship roles in the US healthcare system for nearly 40 years in both the public and private sectors covering the for-profit and non-profit arenas. He has led major private payers providing healthcare coverage to millions of subscribers, as well as start-up and mid-stage health technology companies backed by private equity and venture partners. Tina S. Nova, Ph.D. has extensive experience growing dynamic commercial organizations in new markets within the molecular diagnostics field. Since August 2018, she has served as president and chief executive officer of Decipher Biosciences Inc. Previously Dr. Nova was president and chief executive officer of Molecular Stethoscope Inc., and served as senior vice president and general manager of Illumina’s oncology business unit. Dr. Nova was a co-founder of Genoptix, a medical laboratory diagnostics company, and served as its president and chief executive officer from 2000 to 2014. Genoptix was acquired by Novartis AG in 2011. Dr. Nova was co-founder of Nanogen, a provider of molecular diagnostic tests, and served as its chief operating officer and president from 1994 to 2000. She previously served as chief operating officer of Selective Genetics, and held various positions with Ligand Pharmaceuticals and Hybritech. Dr. Nova serves as the chair of the board of directors for Arena Pharmaceuticals and as a member of the board of directors of Veracyte, a diagnostics company. Dr. Robertson has been active in the life sciences sector for more than 30 years. Prior to joining H.I.G., he served most recently as Managing Director at Toucan Capital. Prior to his private equity career, Dr. Robertson was Director of Business Development at IGEN International, where he was responsible for formulating and implementing IGEN's partnering and M&A strategies. Dr. Robertson started his career as a Research Manager at W.R. Grace & Co., focusing on medical devices. Dr. Robertson currently serves on the boards of Apollo Endosurgery, RxSight, CardioFocus, Clarus Therapeutics, Iconic Therapeutics, and Intact Vascular.
Exagen Inc. is a provider of autoimmune testing and its purpose as an organization is to provide clarity in autoimmune disease decision-making. The Company has developed and is commercializing a portfolio of testing products, under its AVISE brand. It commercially launched its testing product, AVISE CTD, which enables differential diagnosis for patients presenting with symptoms indicative of a variety of connective tissue diseases (CTDs) and other related diseases with overlapping symptoms. The comprehensive nature of AVISE CTD allows for the testing of various relevant biomarkers in one convenient blood draw. Included in AVISE CTD is its proprietary AVISE Lupus test, which enables the diagnosis of systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) based on levels of erythrocyte bound C4d (EC4d) and B cell C4d (BC4d); along with anti-nuclear antibodies (ANA) and double-stranded DNA antibodies (ds-DNA). AVISE Lupus provides rheumatologists and their patients with sensitive and specific results.