Who We Are
Our Management team has extensive experience in drug development, commercialization, and partnering transactions. Scientific Advisory Board members are world-class experts in rare epilepsies, translational research, and clinical care.
Management Team
Darren Cline, MBA
Darren Cline is a seasoned pharmaceutical industry executive who brings an over 30-year track record of building key commercial organizations and functions.
Before joining Epygenix, Mr. Cline was most recently the US Chief Commercial Officer at GW Pharmaceuticals where he led the successful commercialization of Epidiolex for rare epilepsies, which helped lead to the company’s $7.2 billion acquisition by Jazz Pharmaceuticals in 2021. Before that, he was Executive Vice President, Commercial at Seagen where he was responsible for the commercialization of ADCETRIS in the United States and Canada. Mr. Cline also held commercial leadership roles at Intermune, Alexion Pharmaceuticals, and Amgen. He is currently a member of Pyxis Oncology Board of Directors and was formerly on the Stemline Therapeutics Board of Directors.
Mr. Cline received his Masters of Business Administration from Pepperdine University and Bachelors from San Diego State University.
G. Michael Landis, CPA
Mr. Landis is a highly accomplished financial executive who brings an over 25-year track record of public company expertise, capital market transactions, investor relations, and financial reporting.
Prior to joining Epygenix, Mr. Landis was most recently the Chief Financial Officer at Avisa Diagnostics Inc., a publicly traded medical device company. While there, he was responsible for strategic and tactical finance initiatives and was directly involved with investor relations and capital raising activities. Before that, he served as Principal Accounting Officer and Treasurer at Lannett Company Inc., a publicly traded pharmaceutical company, where he led acquisitions and related financing activities and was a member of the executive team that successfully completed a $1.2 billion acquisition. Mr. Landis was also actively involved in the Initial Public Offering (IPO) process in previous financial leadership roles at companies including Akrion Inc. and AlliedBarton Security Services, LLC. Earlier, he worked at various other publicly traded companies after beginning his career within the Big Four public accounting firms.
Mr. Landis received his Bachelors in Accounting from Franklin & Marshall College and is an active Certified Public Account.
Alex Yang, J.D., L.L.M.
Alex Yang, J.D., L.L.M. is the original funder of Epygenix Therapeutics, Inc. and the CEO/owner of Mstone Partners which serves as the major shareholder of Epygenix Therapeutics Inc. Alex also serves as the CEO of Curyx Partners, a biotech incubation platform which has set up a number of drug development companies in both pre-clinical and clinical stages.
Alex has over 25 years of experience in advising and executing fund formation, cross-border transactions and a diverse pool of investment experiences in multiple industry sectors. He currently serves investment and risk committee member roles for various regional and country-focused private equity funds. Alex is formerly a managing partner at Kim & Chang and was a partner at the Ernst & Young Hong Kong office leading regional financial services practice, including banking and capital markets, asset management and insurance.
Alex formerly worked at the Morgan Stanley Hong Kong Office in the capacity of its Asia Private Equity and In-house Counsel, focused on buy-outs and grow-capital investments, real estate, special situation and infrastructure transactions across Asia. He also worked at Coopers & Lybrand and Ernst & Young New York offices in their international tax and consulting divisions.
Alex graduated from New York University School of Law with both J.D. and L.L.M. degrees and a bar with the State of New York and received an undergraduate degree from Binghamton University with Economics.
Hahn-Jun Lee, M.Sc., Ph.D.
Hahn-Jun Lee, M.Sc., Ph.D. is a serial entrepreneur who founded Epygenix Therapeutics, Inc. which develops precision medicines for rare and intractable pediatric genetic epilepsies. He also founded Polaryx Therapeutics, Inc which develops patient-friendly medicines for lysosomal storage disorders and Focus Therapeutics, L.L.C., a business catalyst in the biotech-pharma industry. He also co-founded Curyx Partners, LLC, a drug development platform.
He has extensive experiences in R&D, deal making, business development, and consulting several top-notch health care venture capital firms and global pharma and biotech companies, including Doman Associates, Shire Human Genetic Therapies, P&G Pharma, Melior Discovery, CDI, etc. He also consulted with several Korean biotechs, venture capital firms, and research institutes.
Dr. Lee was an Assistant Professor of Biotechnology in the Department of Orthopedic Surgery, College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia University in the City of New York. He also worked as a Staff Scientist at the RIKEN Brain Science Institute in Japan.
He obtained a B.S. in Life Science from Sogang University, Seoul, Korea. He completed his M.S. and Ph.D. in applied biotechnology in the Department of Applied Biotechnology at the University of Tokyo, Japan.
Anthony Lam, CFA, CPA
Anthony Lam has over 20 years of experience in private equity investing. He was Chief Investment Officer of Transpac Capital Limited, one of the earliest pan-Asian venture capital/private equity platforms in the region. Before joining Transpac, Mr. Lam was one of the Founding Managing Directors and Head of China at Asia Climate Partners, the largest climate related private equity fund in the region. Prior to Asia Climate Partners, he was Managing Director and Co-Head Asia Pacific of TRG Management, The Rohatyn Group. Mr. Lam served on the global investment committee and managed a portfolio of seven investee companies with a total investment amount of over $600 million in China, Singapore, South Korea as well as Thailand. Prior to joining TRG, Mr. Lam was a Partner at Citigroup Venture Capital International, the private equity arm of Citigroup, with cumulative AUM over US $6 billion. During his tenure at Citigroup, Mr. Lam had led or actively participated in private equity transactions in a variety of industries including healthcare, renewable energy, financial, consumer, retail, telecommunication, industrial and technology. Mr. Lam received his M.B.A. from the Chinese University of Hong Kong and is a Chartered Financial Analyst and Certified Public Accountant-Inactive.
Andrew O
Andrew O is a seasoned investor and executive with over 25 years of financial, investment, investor relations, and management expertise at top financial institutions.
Andrew was most recently Senior Portfolio Manager and Managing Director at Manulife Investment Management. At Manulife, Andrew was Portfolio Manager for the Asia Pacific Ex-Japan Small Cap Fund and Korea Specialist Portfolio Manager for larger regional mandates. Among his principal roles was marketing to and communicating with institutional investors. He had full investment discretion and responsibility for portfolio construction; single stock fundamental analysis; position sizing; monitoring and liquidation; sector and country allocation management; specialist team management; P&L; risk and volatility management.
Earlier, he served as Managing Director at Horizon Asset International as a Portfolio Manager running an Asia Ex-Japan Long-Short fundamental book, Executive Director and Head of Research at FrontPoint Partners (Morgan Stanley Investment Management subsidiary) for the Asia Ex-Japan Long-Short fundamental package, and Executive Director at Goldman Sachs in the Equities Division. Before that, Andrew served as Assistant Investment Officer in the Asia Financial Markets group at the International Finance Corporation, the World Bank’s private investment arm.
Andrew received his Bachelor’s from the University of Pennsylvania and undertook Master’s level studies at Yonsei University’s Graduate School of International Studies.
Mary Shatzoff, M.Sc., RAC
Mary Shatzoff, M.Sc., RAC, has over 25 years of experience in Regulatory Affairs in the pharmaceutical industry in clinical drug development. She is currently on the faculty at Wake Forest School of Medicine as an Adjunct Professor of Regulatory Affairs. She also worked at Sanofi Aventis and Pfizer and as an independent consultant for several companies.
She has contributed to over 100 drug and biologic product applications and led and participated in development and marketing approval of products with therapeutic areas: Anti-Infective, Gastroenterology, Dermatology, Urology, and Neurology. She has extensive experiences with regulatory bodies such as FDA (CDER, CBER, and OOPD), EMA, Health Canada, and TGA.
She has a Regulatory Affairs Certification (RAC-US) and is a Certified Quality Auditor (CQA).
Luis Rojas, M.Sc., Ph.D.
Luis Rojas, M.Sc., Ph.D. is a research scientist statistician with approximately 35 years of experience that expands to the pharmaceutical, CRO, academic and medical device industries.
As the Head of Biometrics at Epygenix, he supports protocol development and all biometrics activities.
Dr. Rojas is a Subject Matter Expert in Study Design, Master Protocols, RWD/RWE, Bioequivalence, Advanced Analytics (missing data, testing strategies, modeling, simulations, data mining and machine learning), interim analysis, data monitoring committees, the process for converting clinical data into CDISC compliant datasets, and reporting to regulatory agencies.
He holds a Ph.D. in Biostatistics from the Rafael Belloso University in Venezuela, and he is a member of the American Statistical Association, The Sigma Xi Scientific Research Society, and a member of the DIA Adaptive Design Scientific Working Group. He has published several papers and presented in multiple settings worldwide topics associated with Rare Diseases, adaptive designs, RWE/RWD, the estimand and other clinical research/biostatistics topics.
Colleen Johnson, M.Sc., D.A.B.T
Colleen Johnson, M.S., D.A.B.T is a board certified toxicologist who has been working with small- to mid-sized pharmaceuticals companies for more than 20 years. Her focus has primarily been in small molecule development for a broad range of indications. She is involved in providing toxicology expertise for all phases of development from early discovery to NDA and BLA applications. She received her undergraduate training at the University of California Santa Barbara and her graduate training at the University of Arizona. Colleen has overseen all aspects of the nonclinical development program on behalf of Epygenix Therapeutics Inc.
Board of Directors
Alex Yang, J.D., L.L.M.
Alex Yang, J.D., L.L.M.
Alex Yang, J.D., L.L.M. is the original funder of Epygenix Therapeutics, Inc. and the CEO/owner of Mstone Partners which serves as the major shareholder of Epygenix Therapeutics Inc. Alex also serves as the CEO of Curyx Partners, a biotech incubation platform which has set up a number of drug development companies in both pre-clinical and clinical stages.
Alex has over 25 years of experience in advising and executing fund formation, cross-border transactions and a diverse pool of investment experiences in multiple industry sectors. He currently serves investment and risk committee member roles for various regional and country-focused private equity funds. Alex is formerly a managing partner at Kim & Chang and was a partner at the Ernst & Young Hong Kong office leading regional financial services practice, including banking and capital markets, asset management and insurance.
Alex formerly worked at the Morgan Stanley Hong Kong Office in the capacity of its Asia Private Equity and In-house Counsel, focused on buy-outs and grow-capital investments, real estate, special situation and infrastructure transactions across Asia. He also worked at Coopers & Lybrand and Ernst & Young New York offices in their international tax and consulting divisions.
Alex graduated from New York University School of Law with both J.D. and L.L.M. degrees and a bar with the State of New York and received an undergraduate degree from Binghamton University with Economics.
Hahn-Jun Lee, M.Sc., Ph.D.
Hahn-Jun Lee, M.Sc., Ph.D.
Hahn-Jun Lee, M.Sc., Ph.D. is a serial entrepreneur who founded Epygenix Therapeutics, Inc. which develops precision medicines for rare and intractable pediatric genetic epilepsies. He also founded Polaryx Therapeutics, Inc which develops patient-friendly medicines for lysosomal storage disorders and Focus Therapeutics, L.L.C., a business catalyst in the biotech-pharma industry. He also co-founded Curyx Partners, LLC, a drug development platform.
He has extensive experiences in R&D, deal making, business development, and consulting several top-notch health care venture capital firms and global pharma and biotech companies, including Doman Associates, Shire Human Genetic Therapies, P&G Pharma, Melior Discovery, CDI, etc. He also consulted with several Korean biotechs, venture capital firms, and research institutes.
Dr. Lee was an Assistant Professor of Biotechnology in the Department of Orthopedic Surgery, College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia University in the City of New York. He also worked as a Staff Scientist at the RIKEN Brain Science Institute in Japan.
He obtained a B.S. in Life Science from Sogang University, Seoul, Korea. He completed his M.S. and Ph.D. in applied biotechnology in the Department of Applied Biotechnology at the University of Tokyo, Japan.
Darren Cline, MBA
Darren Cline, MBA
Darren Cline is a seasoned pharmaceutical industry executive who brings an over 30-year track record of building key commercial organizations and functions.
Before joining Epygenix, Mr. Cline was most recently the US Chief Commercial Officer at GW Pharmaceuticals where he led the successful commercialization of Epidiolex for rare epilepsies, which helped lead to the company’s $7.2 billion acquisition by Jazz Pharmaceuticals in 2021. Before that, he was Executive Vice President, Commercial at Seagen where he was responsible for the commercialization of ADCETRIS in the United States and Canada. Mr. Cline also held commercial leadership roles at Intermune, Alexion Pharmaceuticals, and Amgen. He is currently a member of Pyxis Oncology Board of Directors and was formerly on the Stemline Therapeutics Board of Directors.
Mr. Cline received his Masters of Business Administration from Pepperdine University and Bachelors from San Diego State University.
Scott C. Baraban, Ph.D.
Scott C. Baraban, Ph.D.
Scott C. Baraban, Ph.D. is Professor of Neurological Surgery and William K. Bowes Jr. Endowed Chair in Neuroscience Research at UCSF where he directs an epilepsy research laboratory in the Department of Neurological Surgery. Scott is a co-founder of Epygenix Therapeutics, Inc.
Dr. Baraban’s pioneering research focuses on translational discoveries and includes work on models of pediatric epilepsy in zebrafish and interneuron-based cell therapies for epilepsy. The first zebrafish models for epilepsy were developed in his laboratory over 10 years ago, and his group published the first high-throughput drug screenings using a zebrafish model for Dravet syndrome. He has authored more than 100 publications, including papers in the Journal of Neuroscience, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, Neuron, Nature Communications, Science, and Nature Neuroscience. He has received several research honors, including the Basil O’ Connor Scholar Research award, a Klingenstein Foundation Fellowship in Neuroscience, and an NIH EUREKA award. He was recently awarded a Javits Neuroscience Investigator Award from the NIH and the Basic Science Research award from the American Epilepsy Society.
Dr. Baraban received his Bachelor’s degree from Johns Hopkins University and his Ph.D. from the University of Virginia. He completed postdoctoral training at the University of Washington. He currently serves on the Scientific Advisory Board of the Dravet Syndrome Foundation and Gruppo Famiglie Dravet Associazione of Italy.
Scientific Advisory Board
Scott C. Baraban, Ph.D.
Scott C. Baraban, Ph.D. is Professor of Neurological Surgery and William K. Bowes Jr. Endowed Chair in Neuroscience Research at UCSF where he directs an epilepsy research laboratory in the Department of Neurological Surgery. Scott is a co-founder of Epygenix Therapeutics, Inc.
Dr. Baraban’s pioneering research focuses on translational discoveries and includes work on models of pediatric epilepsy in zebrafish and interneuron-based cell therapies for epilepsy. The first zebrafish models for epilepsy were developed in his laboratory over 10 years ago, and his group published the first high-throughput drug screenings using a zebrafish model for Dravet syndrome. He has authored more than 100 publications, including papers in the Journal of Neuroscience, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, Neuron, Nature Communications, Science, and Nature Neuroscience. He has received several research honors, including the Basil O’ Connor Scholar Research award, a Klingenstein Foundation Fellowship in Neuroscience, and an NIH EUREKA award. He was recently awarded a Javits Neuroscience Investigator Award from the NIH and the Basic Science Research award from the American Epilepsy Society.
Dr. Baraban received his Bachelor’s degree from Johns Hopkins University and his Ph.D. from the University of Virginia. He completed postdoctoral training at the University of Washington. He currently serves on the Scientific Advisory Board of the Dravet Syndrome Foundation and Gruppo Famiglie Dravet Associazione of Italy.
Jack Parent, M.D.
Jack Parent, M.D. is the William J. Herdman Professor of Neurology and co-Director of the Epilepsy Division in the Department of Neurology at the University of Michigan, where he established the Neurodevelopment and Regeneration Laboratory in 2000. His innovative research focuses on the fields of epilepsy, stem cell biology, and regeneration after stroke and other brain injuries. The first “disease-in-a-dish” human induced pluripotent stem cell lines for Dravet syndrome were established in his laboratory.
He has received several awards, including a Paul Beeson Physician Faculty Scholars in Aging Award, a Dreifuss-Penry Epilepsy Award from the American Academy of Neurology, a Grass Foundation Award in Neuroscience from the American Neurological Association, and was inducted into the University of Michigan Medical School League of Research Excellence as a Taubman Scholar. Dr. Parent serves as Secretary of the American Neurological Association, recently served on the Board of the American Epilepsy Society, chairs the Scientific Advisory Board of the Dravet Syndrome Foundation, and has been a standing member on NIH study sections for the past 10 years. He also serves on a number of editorial boards and is the Chief Editor for Basic Science of Epilepsy Currents and the Epilepsy Section Editor of Experimental Neurology.
Dr. Parent received an A.B. with distinction in Human Biology from Stanford University and his M.D. from Yale University School of Medicine. He completed medical internship, neurology residency, clinical epilepsy fellowship, and post-doctoral training in neuroscience research at the University of California, San Francisco.
Kelly Knupp, M.D.
Kelly Knupp, M.D. is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics and Neurology at the University of Colorado.
She received her medical degree from the University of New Mexico – School of Medicine, completed her residency in Pediatrics at Children’s Hospital of New York followed by Pediatric Neurology Residency at Columbia University at Children’s Hospital of New York. After her residency, she trained as a Clinical Fellow in Pediatric Epilepsy at the Columbia Comprehensive Epilepsy Center at New York Presbyterian Hospital.
Dr. Knupp now practices at Children’s Hospital Colorado in Aurora, CO. and is the Associate Research Director of Neuroscience Institute and Director of the Dravet Program. Her interests are epileptic encephalopathies including Dravet Syndrome and infantile spasms. She was a founding member of the Pediatric Epilepsy Research Consortium and continues on the steering committee.
This group focuses on developing collaborative research across the country for children with epileptic encephalopathies. She also serves on the medical advisory boards of the Epilepsy Foundation of Colorado, Round up River Ranch and the Dravet Syndrome Foundation.
Joseph Sullivan, M.D.
Joseph Sullivan, M.D. is a Professor of Neurology and Pediatrics at the University of California San Francisco and Director of the UCSF Pediatric Epilepsy Center at Benioff Children’s Hospital. As a pediatric epileptologist, he cares for all children with various forms of epilepsy but has specific clinical and research interests in Dravet Syndrome, PCDH19 related epilepsy and the evaluation of children for epilepsy surgery. Dr. Sullivan is a member of the American Epilepsy Society and serves on boards including Chair of the PCDH19 Alliance Scientific Advisory Board, Chair of the Epilepsy Foundation of Northern California, and is a member of the Medical Advisory Board for the Dravet Syndrome Foundation and the Pediatric Epilepsy Research Consortium Steering Committee.
He is a graduate of Union College and Albany Medical College. He completed a pediatric residency at the Children’s Memorial Hospital of Northwestern University in Chicago where he spent an additional year as pediatric chief resident. He then completed his Neurology, Child Neurology and Epilepsy training at the Hospital of University of Pennsylvania and The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia before coming to UCSF in 2007.
Linda Laux, M.D.
Linda Laux, M.D. is the Medical Director of the Comprehensive Epilepsy Center at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago and Associate Professor of Pediatrics (Neurology and Epilepsy) at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.
Her clinical and research focus includes neurology, epilepsy syndromes, genetics of epilepsy syndromes, pediatric epilepsies, and Dravet syndrome. She is board-certified in epilepsy and neurology with a special qualification in child neurology by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology. She is also a member of the American Clinical Neurophysiology Society, American Epilepsy Society, and Child Neurology Society.
Dr. Laux received her M.D. from St. Louis University. She completed a fellowship in pediatric epilepsy at the Children’s Memorial Hospital at Northwestern University, fellowship in neurology/child neurology at Barrow’s Neurologic Institute/St. Joseph’s Hospital, and a residency in pediatrics at the University of Arizona Health Science Center.
Mitchel Berger, M.D.
Mitchel S. Berger, M.D. is a nationally recognized expert in treating brain and spinal cord tumors as well as tumor-related epilepsy in adults and children. He also is a specialist in brain mapping techniques – used to identify and preserve areas of motor, sensory and language function during surgery – and an expert in using the Gamma Knife, a precise, noninvasive tool that applies radiation beams for tumor treatment. He is director of the Brain Tumor Center, director of the Center for Neurological Injury and Repair and co-director of the Adult Brain Tumor Surgery Program at the University of California San Francisco.
Dr. Berger earned his bachelor’s degree from Harvard College in 1975 and his medical degree from the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine in 1979. He completed an internship and a residency at UCSF, and was awarded a clinical fellowship in neuro-oncology by the American Cancer Society and a research fellowship by the Brain Tumor Research Center. He completed further fellowship training in neuro-oncology at UCSF and in pediatric neurosurgery at the Hospital for Sick Children, an affiliate of the University of Toronto.
Dr. Berger was elected to the American Association of Neurological Surgeons’ board of directors and appointed to the American Board of Neurological Surgery.
Peter B. Crino, M.D., Ph.D.
Peter B. Crino is the inaugural Richard and Kathryn Taylor Endowed Professor and Chair of Neurology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore. He received his B.A. from Binghamton University, M.D. from Yale University (cum laude, Alpha Omega Alpha), and Ph.D. in neuroscience from Boston University. He completed a medical internship at Yale-New Haven Hospital, neurology residency, and post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania with clinical training in epilepsy. Dr. Crino has received a Howard Hughes Physician Post-Doctoral Fellowship, the Esther A. and Joseph Klingenstein Fellowship Award in Neuroscience in 1999, the Lifetime Service Award from the TSC Alliance in 2008, the Fritz Dreifuss Award for Translational Research in Epilepsy from the American Epilepsy Society in 2016, and the NINDS Javits Neuroscience Investigator Award in 2021.
In 2019, Dr. Crino received funding from the state of Maryland to support the new Clinical Center for Adults with Neuro-Developmental Disabilities (CCAND) at University of Maryland Medical Center. This program provides comprehensive care for adults with autism, epilepsy, and intellectual disability. Dr. Crino also directs the TSC Center of Excellence in Maryland. He is Chair of the Board of Directors of the TSC Alliance.
Dr. Crino’s laboratory has maintained a continuously NINDS funded translational research program studying mechanisms of altered brain development associated with epilepsy, intellectual disability, and autism for the past 23 years. He has >170 published papers, reviews, and book chapters and numerous international and media presentations.
Investor Information
MSTONE PARTNERS
Established in 2013, Mstone Partners makes principal investments and provides asset management and financial advisory services worldwide with a primary focus in the Asia-Pacific region. Our investment strategy focuses on two specific industry sectors: 1) healthcare & bio; and 2) real estate. With our experienced team of professionals and extensive network of industry experts, we assist small and medium enterprises in expanding their businesses overseas.