Heather Turner, J.D., has served as Chief Executive Officer and director of LB Pharmaceuticals since November 2024. She previously served as President and Chief Executive Officer of Carmot Therapeutics where she led a $150 million crossover financing and a dual track IPO and strategic transaction process which ultimately resulted in the acquisition of Carmot by Roche for $3.1 billion. During her tenure, she also helped scale the organization and build leadership across key corporate functions.  

Before Carmot, Ms. Turner served as Chief General Counsel and Secretary at Lyell Immunopharma, Inc. where she oversaw a $400 million Series C financing and the fourth largest Nasdaq IPO which raised gross proceeds of approximately $425 million. In addition, Ms. Turner oversaw numerous strategic partnerships including a development and commercialization partnership with GSK. She previously held executive legal, operational and strategic roles at Sangamo Therapeutics, Atara Biotherapeutics, Inc., and Orexigen Therapeutics. She started her career at Cooley as a corporate securities associate. 

Ms. Turner received her J.D. from UCLA School of Law and her B.A. in Environmental Studies from the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Kaya Pai Panandiker is the Chief Commercial Officer of LB Pharmaceuticals, bringing more than 20 years of commercial and operational leadership experience in the global biopharmaceutical industry with deep expertise in neuroscience and related therapeutic areas. She has built and scaled commercial capabilities for first-launch products and led cross-functional teams to drive pipeline value creation and enterprise growth.

Before joining LB Pharmaceuticals, Ms. Pai Panandiker served as Chief Commercial Officer at Neumora Therapeutics and previously as Head of Commercial at Cerevel Therapeutics, where she built the company’s commercial organization and led all pre-launch planning, access, and market preparation during the period leading to its acquisition by AbbVie in 2024.

Earlier, she spent nearly a decade at Lundbeck, holding senior roles including General Manager, U.S. Neuroscience, and Managing Director, Latin America, with full P&L leadership across both regions. In the U.S., she oversaw the launches of Rexulti and Trintellix and the bipolar indication for Abilify Maintena, delivering blockbuster sales across the neuroscience franchise. In Latin America, she expanded Rexulti into new markets and built and scaled regional commercial and medical infrastructure, driving growth and profitability across the region and portfolio. She began her career in strategy consulting before holding commercial roles at Pfizer and Takeda Pharmaceuticals. 

Ms. Pai Panandiker holds a Master’s degree in Public Policy from the University of Chicago and a B.A. from the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

Gad Soffer is the Chief Operating and Business Officer at LB Pharmaceuticals. He brings over two decades of leadership experience in biopharma corporate strategy, business development, late-stage development, and operational execution and has held executive roles across public and private biotech companies overseeing drug development, manufacturing, business development, finance, and corporate strategy. 

Prior to joining LB Pharmaceuticals, Mr. Soffer served as Chief Operating Officer at Rheos Medicines, where he led corporate strategy, finance, and business development efforts, securing a $700 million strategic collaboration with Roche. He previously served as Chief Strategy Officer and Chief Operating Officer at Atara Biotherapeutics, where he helped scale the company from a four-person startup to a publicly traded company of approximately 300 employees. 

Earlier in his career, he held roles at Celgene, where he led numerous business development transactions as well as global development for Abraxane, and in biotech-focused investment and consulting roles. Mr. Soffer currently serves on the Board of Directors of General Metabolics.

Joseph Miller is the Chief Financial Officer of LB Pharmaceuticals and brings more than 20 years of experience leading financial strategy, operations and enterprise transformation for both clinical and commercial stage publicly traded biotech and pharmaceutical companies.  

Before joining LB Pharmaceuticals, Joe served as Chief Financial Officer of Aurinia Pharmaceuticals, where he built and scaled the company’s financial and operational infrastructure through its transition from late-stage clinical development to the successful commercial launch of LUPKYNIS (voclosporin). He previously served as Chief Financial Officer, Principal Executive Officer, and Corporate Secretary of Avalo Therapeutics (formerly Cerecor, Inc.), and held finance leadership roles at Sucampo Pharmaceuticals, Inc., QIAGEN N.V., Eppendorf GmbH, and KPMG LLP.  

Joseph received his B.S. in Accounting from Villanova University, and is a member of the Pennsylvania Institute of Certified Public Accountants (inactive) and the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.

Susan Kozauer, M.D. is the Chief Medical Officer of LB Pharmaceuticals and brings more than 20 years of experience spanning early-stage clinical studies through regulatory approval across various neuropsychiatric indications.  

Before joining LB Pharmaceuticals, Dr. Kozauer most recently served as Senior Vice President, Head of Clinical Development at Centessa Pharmaceuticals, where she led the development of orexin agonists in rare hypersomnias and other neuropsychiatric indications. Prior to that, she was Vice President, Clinical Development at Intra-Cellular Therapies, Inc., where her work with CAPLYTA (lumateperone) in schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, major depressive disorder, and pediatric indications resulted in multiple FDA approvals. Earlier in her career, she held clinical development roles at Premier Research and IQVIA and was also a practicing psychiatrist with special interest in treatment resistant depression.   

Dr. Kozauer received a B.A. from Cornell University, an M.D from George Washington University, and completed her residency in psychiatry at Georgetown University Hospital. 

Minako Pazdera, J.D., Ph.D., is the General Counsel and Corporate Secretary of LB Pharmaceuticals and brings more than 25 years of legal experience in the life sciences industry. 

Previously, Dr. Pazdera served as General Counsel and Corporate Secretary at Kardigan, Inc. where she built the legal function and oversaw the execution of the company’s Series B financing and acquisition of Prolaio, Inc. Prior to Kardigan, she served as General Counsel and Corporate Secretary at Carmot Therapeutics, Inc. where she led the legal function in the company’s crossover round of financing and dual track IPO and strategic transaction process, which resulted in the company’s acquisition by Roche. Prior to Carmot, Dr. Pazdera served as Vice President of Intellectual Property at Lyell Immunopharma, Inc. and Sangamo Therapeutics, Inc. She has also held various positions at Genentech, Inc., including Associate General Counsel, overseeing intellectual property matters for Genentech’s oncology products and pipeline. Prior to going in-house, Dr. Pazdera practiced intellectual property law at Ropes & Gray LLP and Fish & Neave LLP in New York and at Marshall, Gerstein & Borun LLP in Chicago. 

She holds a J.D. from Fordham University School of Law, a Ph.D. in Biological Sciences from Carnegie Mellon University, and a B.A. in Molecular Cell Biology from the University of California, Berkeley.

Lindsay Beaupre has served as Senior Vice President of People and Culture at LB Pharmaceuticals since December 2025. Ms. Beaupre leads the company’s people strategy across talent, organizational development, employee engagement, total rewards, and related people and culture initiatives as the company accelerates towards commercialization. 

Before joining LB Pharmaceuticals, Ms. Beaupre served as Chief Administrative Officer at Lyndra Therapeutics, where she led enterprise-wide people and operational initiatives. Ms. Beaupre also served as a People and Culture leader at Vertex Pharmaceuticals, supporting senior corporate functions and their global leadership teams. 

Prior to joining Vertex, Ms. Beaupre served as Senior Director of Human Resources at ImmunoGen, where she managed the implementation of a company-wide performance management system and provided onsite professional development and leadership training. She also held human resources roles of increasing responsibility at Fidelity Investments and State Street Corporation.

Ms. Beaupre holds a B.S. in Management from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. 

Marc Panoff is Senior Vice President of Finance at LB Pharmaceuticals and has been with the Company since 2016 in multiple financial management capacities. 

Prior to joining the Company, Marc was the Chief Financial Officer of a number of life science focused companies, including Neurologix, Inc. and Nephros, Inc., and has also served as an independent consultant to several companies. 

Marc received his B.S. in Business Administration from Washington University in St. Louis and his MBA from Arizona State University.

James Rawls, Pharm.D., has served as Senior Vice President, Regulatory Affairs, since October 2025.

He joined LB Pharmaceuticals from Boston Biodevelopment, LLC, where he served as Executive Vice President and Chief Regulatory Officer, leading regulatory strategy and execution for multiple small and mid-sized biopharma clients. Prior to that, he held senior regulatory leadership roles at Sumitomo Pharma America, where he built and oversaw a regulatory team of more than 60 employees following the integration of seven subsidiaries, including Sunovion. 

During his 15-year tenure at Sunovion, Dr. Rawls led the Global Regulatory Affairs function and supported numerous global product approvals and lifecycle expansions across multiple therapeutic areas. He also spent over a decade in increasingly senior regulatory roles at Novartis. 

Dr. Rawls earned his Pharm.D. from the University of Michigan and completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Regulatory Affairs and Clinical Research at Novartis and Rutgers University.

Ellen Rose has served as Senior Vice President, Corporate Affairs since December 2025. She brings deep experience leading integrated communication, investor relations, and patient advocacy strategies for public biopharmaceutical companies during periods of transformation and clinical advancement. 

She has a proven track record of directing strategies that support corporate growth and strengthen reputation and has helped facilitate public offerings totaling approximately $750 million. Previously, she was Senior Vice President, Communications and Investor Relations at Lyell Immunopharma, a publicly traded CAR-T cell therapy company, where she led corporate communications and investor relations as a member of the executive leadership team. Before Lyell, Ms. Rose was Senior Vice President, Communications and Chief of Staff to the CEO at Prothena Corporation, plc., a publicly traded company advancing therapies for neurodegenerative and rare diseases. 

Earlier in her career, Ms. Rose held several positions of increasing responsibility at Johnson & Johnson, guiding global communications across multiple therapeutic areas, including a role as Communications and External Affairs Leader for Johnson & Johnson Innovation where she helped launch Johnson & Johnson Innovations centers in the U.S., Europe and Asia Pacific. 

Ms. Rose earned a B.A. in International Relations from Stanford University.

Rich A. Silva, Ph.D., has served as our Senior Vice President of Technical Operations at LB Pharmaceuticals since February 2025. 

Before joining LB Pharmaceuticals, Dr. Silva served as Senior Vice President of Pharmaceutical Sciences at Carmot Therapeutics. There, he led the expansion of the CMC group, overseeing drug substance and product development, device and combination product development, analytical strategies, supply chain, and regulatory compliance. His leadership was instrumental in Carmot’s successful acquisition by Roche, streamlining integration and enhancing operational efficiency. 

Previously, he held key leadership roles at Epizyme and ImmunoGen, where he managed technical operations, optimized manufacturing processes, led regulatory filings and has contributed to the successful commercialization of multiple therapies, including Tazverik and Elahere. 

Dr. Silva earned his Ph.D. in Synthetic Organic Chemistry from Dartmouth College and a B.S. in Chemistry from the University of Massachusetts.

Christopher Zergebel serves as our Senior Vice President, Clinical Operations at LB Pharmaceuticals and brings more than 25 years of global development operations experience across biotechnology and pharmaceutical organizations. He has deep expertise building and leading cross-functional teams across clinical operations, data management, and project and portfolio management, with a focus on aligning clinical development strategy with operational execution.

Prior to joining LB Pharmaceuticals, Mr. Zergebel served as Vice President, Development Operations at Cellectis Biologics, where he led global clinical development strategy and operations from early-stage through post-approval trials. He has held senior leadership roles responsible for establishing and optimizing development operations functions, overseeing R&D budgets, and executing clinical programs across stages of development.

Throughout his career, Mr. Zergebel has led clinical operations for programs resulting in regulatory submissions and approvals and has built global project management and clinical infrastructure capabilities. 

Mr. Zergebel holds a B.A. in Biology from Boston University.

Scott Garland is an advisor for Google Ventures and a Venture Advisor for Vida Ventures. 

Mr. Garland most recently served as the Chief Executive Officer of PACT Pharma. Prior to PACT, he served as President and Chief Executive Officer of Portola Pharmaceuticals until it was acquired by Alexion Pharmaceuticals in 2020. Before joining Portola, Mr. Garland was at Relypsa, where he served first as Chief Commercial Officer and then as President after Relypsa’s acquisition by Vifor Pharma for $1.5B. 

Prior to Relypsa, Mr. Garland served as Executive Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer of Exelixis. Mr. Garland has held numerous other commercial leadership roles at Genentech, Amgen and Merck, including leading the commercial franchises for two multi-billion-dollar therapies — Avastin and Rituxan. 

He currently serves as a member of the board of directors of Day One Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Olema Oncology, ALX Oncology, and Enliven Therapeutics, Inc. He previously served on the board of directors of Karyopharm Therapeutics and Calithera Biosciences. He holds a B.S. in Biological Sciences from California Polytechnic State University (San Luis Obispo) and an MBA from Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business.

Rekha Hemrajani is a biopharma operations and finance leader with over 20 years of experience. 

Ms. Hemrajani currently serves as a member of the board of directors of several public companies including ALX Oncology, MaxCyte, and BioAge Labs. She previously served as a director of Adverum Biotechnologies. She served as Chief Executive Officer and Director of Jiya Acquisition Corporation. Prior to that, she served as President, Chief Executive Officer, and Director of Aravive. Ms. Hemrajani has also served in C-suite operations and finance roles at Arcus Biosciences, RAPT Therapeutics, and Sagimet Biosciences. 

Earlier in her career, she served as Vice President, Head of Licensing and M&A at Onyx Pharmaceuticals (acquired by Amgen), in business development roles at Exelixis, and in healthcare investment banking at Credit Suisse First Boston and Lehman Brothers where she advised companies on capital raising, and mergers and acquisitions. Ms. Hemrajani holds a B.S. in Economics and Computer Science from the University of Michigan and an MBA from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University.

Will Kane has over three decades of biopharmaceutical leadership experience, with a proven track record of building high-performing teams, leading through transformational changes, and delivering exceptional business results across a wide range of therapeutic areas. Will is currently the CEO of Uniquity Bio, a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company advancing solrikitug, a treatment in development for both respiratory and gastrointestinal diseases. 

He previously served as President and Chief Commercial Officer of Anthos Therapeutics, where he led the operational scale up of the company and the pre-commercialization work on abelacimab, and helped drive the recent acquisition of Anthos by Novartis. Prior to that, Will was the Chief Commercial Officer at Karuna Therapeutics, where he was responsible for the commercialization strategy and plan for Cobenfy and played a key role in preparing the company for its next phase of growth.

Before joining Karuna, Will led the commercial organization at BioXcel Therapeutics, where he helped build the company and secure over $300M in capital investment. Earlier in his career, Will held senior leadership roles at Allergan, where he led the General Medicine division with over $5.8B in revenue and was responsible for the launches of Namzaric, Vraylar, and Ubrelvy; and Pfizer, where he was instrumental in the success of multiple blockbuster products, including Zoloft, Zyrtec and Celebrex.

Mr. Kane received his MBA from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and a B.A. in Government from Connecticut College.

Robert Lenz, M.D., Ph.D., is a veteran R&D leader with more than 20 years of neuroscience drug development experience. Dr. Lenz currently serves as a scientific advisor to several biopharmaceutical companies. 

Most recently, he served as Executive Vice President and Head of Research and Development at Neumora Therapeutics. Prior to that, he spent more than a decade at Amgen in key leadership roles including Senior Vice President and Head of Global Development. Earlier in his career, he held positions of increasing responsibility at Abbott Laboratories, ultimately serving as Divisional Vice President for Neuroscience, Anesthesia and Psychiatry Development. Over the course of his career, Dr. Lenz has overseen the development of multiple medicines through regulatory approval and driven innovation across research and clinical development organizations. 

He earned his M.D. and Ph.D., with honors, from the University of Maryland School of Medicine, completed his neurology residency at the University of California, Los Angeles, holds a bachelor’s degree from Dickinson College, and has received multiple awards recognizing his innovation and leadership in the pharmaceutical industry.

Rebecca Luse has 17 years of experience in the health care investment business. She joined Deep Track Capital from New Leaf Venture Partners where she worked for six years, most recently as a Principal leading the crossover and public company strategy. 

She has been a board member and observer for several biotechnology companies. Previously, she spent four years on the sell side at both Jefferies and Piper Jaffray, covering biotechnology and specialty pharmaceuticals companies. She started her career as an investment banking analyst in the health care group of Bank of America and as a venture capital associate at Bay City Capital. 

She earned a B.S. in Biochemistry and Mathematics from Indiana University.

Ran Nussbaum is a Managing Partner and Co-Founder of Pontifax, an investment firm focused on innovative biotech, and life science companies with approximately $1.2 billion assets under management. The fund runs more than 55 portfolio companies worldwide. His work revolves around constant and active involvement in companies, providing them with strategic and business development oversight. 

In the past, Mr. Nussbaum served on the boards of Kite Pharma (sold to Gilead), cCAM Therapeutics (sold to Merck), ArQule Inc. (sold to Merck), Prevail Therapeutics (sold to Eli Lilly) and UroGen Pharma. Currently, he is a board member of many of Pontifax’s portfolio companies including Keros Therapeutics (NASDAQ:KROS), Kamari Pharma, Lutris Therapeutics and Adcytherix Therapeutics. He also serves as Graviton Pharma’s Chairman of the board. Mr. Nussbaum co-founded Keros Therapeutics and served as its Chairman of the board from establishment until April 2023. In the past he served as Chief Executive Officer of Biomedix and SpearHead.

Robert Ruffolo is the retired President of Research & Development and Corporate Senior Vice President of Wyeth Pharmaceutics (now Pfizer). While at Wyeth, he managed an R&D organization of more than 9,000 scientists, with an annual budget in excess of $3 billion. Prior to joining Wyeth, Dr. Ruffolo spent 17 years at SmithKline Beecham Pharmaceuticals (now GlaxoSmithKline) where he was Senior Vice President and Director of Biological Sciences, Worldwide. Before joining SmithKline Beecham, Dr. Ruffolo spent 6 years at Lilly Research Laboratories where he was Chairman of the Cardiovascular Research Committee.

Heather Turner, J.D., has served as Chief Executive Officer and Director of LB Pharmaceuticals since November 2024. She previously served as President and Chief Executive Officer of Carmot Therapeutics, where she led a $150 million crossover financing and a dual track IPO and strategic transaction process which ultimately resulted in the acquisition of Carmot by Roche for $3.1 billion. During her tenure, she also helped scale the organization and build leadership across key corporate functions.  

Before Carmot, Ms. Turner served as Chief General Counsel and Secretary at Lyell Immunopharma, Inc., where she oversaw a $400 million Series C financing, the company’s approximately $425 million Nasdaq IPO, and strategic partnerships including a development and commercialization partnership with GSK. Earlier, she held executive legal and strategic roles at Sangamo Therapeutics, Atara Biotherapeutics, Inc., and Orexigen Therapeutics. She started her career at Cooley as a corporate securities associate. 

Ms. Turner received her J.D. from UCLA School of Law and her B.A. in Environmental Studies from the University of California, Santa Barbara.