Herophilus Appoints Sharath Hegde, Ph.D. as Chief Scientific Officer as it Scales Drug Discovery Effort for Complex Brain Diseases
Herophilus, a leading biotechnology company developing neurotherapeutics to cure complex brain diseases, has appointed Sharath Hegde, Ph.D. as the company’s new Chief Scientific Officer. Dr. Hegde brings over 30 years of innovation and executive leadership in drug discovery and clinical development to leverage the company’s discovery engine to advance their pipeline of novel drugs for neurological and psychiatric diseases.
As the Chief Scientific Officer of Recursion Pharmaceuticals, Dr. Hegde accelerated critical work with new chemical entities and helped build the company’s reputation as a company harnessing technological advances to industrialize drug discovery. Previously, he served as Senior Vice President and Head of Research at Theravance Biopharma. Prior to Theravance Dr. Hegde was employed at Syntex Corporation, later acquired by Roche Holdings, Ltd. Dr. Hegde has participated in the discovery of more than 16 clinical-stage molecules including the marketed medicines Vibativ® (telavancin), Yupelri® (revefenacin) and several others in late-stage development. To date, he has co-authored over 50 scientific publications and served on the Editorial Board of various journals. Dr. Hegde obtained his Ph.D. in Pharmacology from the University of Houston and B.Pharm/M.Pharm degree in Pharmacy/Pharmacology from the University of Mumbai.
“The deep scientific inquiry foundational in Herophilus’s approach and technology is unlike any other in the industry,” said Dr. Hegde. “It is inspiring to see Herophilus build a sophisticated human disease-recapitulating brain organoid platform, enabled by automation and digital biology, that has the potential to move the needle in drug discovery and bring transformative medicines to millions of patients with devastating brain disease.”
