Edgewise taps new chief medical officer

BOULDER — Edgewise Therapeutics Inc. (Nasdaq: EWTX) has hired Dr. Joanne Donovan as its chief medical officer as the company prepares to begin clinical trials on its lead muscular dystrophy treatment candidate.

The Boulder company said Donovan would head the company’s clinical and regulatory operations for its drug-development pipeline targeting rare muscle disorders.

“Having led multiple rare disease clinical programs through all phases of development, from discovery to approvals, Dr. Donovan brings strong leadership capabilities and a broad skill set to Edgewise,” CEO Kevin Koch said in a statement.

Donovan was most recently chief medical officer at Boston-based Catabasis Pharmaceuticals Inc. since 2011, and previously was vice president of clinical research at Genzyme from 1998 to 2011. Genzyme was the third-largest biotechnology company in the world by employee count when it was acquired by Sanofi SA (Nasdaq: SNY) in 2010.

She received her medical degree from Harvard Medical School and has a doctorate in medical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Edgewise is developing orally delivered genetic treatments for two forms of muscular dystrophy. It raised $202.4 million in May after debuting on the Nasdaq Capital Market with an initial public offering that it confidentially filed late last year.

The drug is recruiting volunteers for a Phase I study to determine baseline safety and expects to end the study in October, according to the federal clinical research database.

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