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Blog Posts

Meet the Team – Our RA, Cat Cleto

We’re excited for the next interview in our “Meet the Team” series! We hear from Cat Cleto, a Fermentation Research Associate, on her path from...
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Blog Posts

Antheia at SynBioBeta 2020

Earlier this month, my cofounder Kristy Hawkins and I presented at SynBioBeta 2020, the flagship conference for the synthetic biology community. This year’s virtual event...
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Blog Posts

Meet the Team – Our Scientist, Ken Takeoka

As a part of our new “Meet the Team” series, we hear from Ken Takeoka, Antheia’s very first employee and a Scientist III. Read on...
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Blog Posts

A Milestone for Drug Manufacturing and Synthetic Biology: Stanford Research Published in Nature

It’s a momentous day for my research team at Stanford University. Today, we’ve announced a new paper published in Nature that describes the first successful...
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Blog Posts

Three plant-based pharmaceuticals: taxol, scopolamine and buprenorphine

Over the last 150 years, the pharmaceutical industry has focused on decoupling the production of medicinal compounds from their sources in the natural world, which...
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Blog Posts

As Featured in STAT: The pharma supply chain is broken. Synthetic biology could fix it.

We started Antheia four years ago with a steadfast commitment to help build a more robust drug supply chain – one that delivers the right...
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Industry News

Chemicals Knowledge Hub: DCAT Week 2024 Andrea Conforto, VP/Biotech for CDMO at Olon and Zack McGahey, COO at Antheia

In this interview with Antheia and Olon, two leading companies in the life sciences industry, we discussed their ongoing partnership, market trends, and the future...
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Blog Posts

Future of Pharma Insights: Q&A with Olon Group 

We sat down with Andrea Conforto, VP of CDMO at Olon Biotech....
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Industry News

PharmaSource: Antheia and Olon Extend Biomanufacturing Partnership

Antheia and Olon have announced a continuation of partnership, leveraging Olon’s fermentation infrastructure for the manufacture of Antheia’s early products...
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Press Releases

Antheia and Olon Continue Partnership for Biomanufacturing Antheia’s Pipeline of KSMs and APIs for Essential Medicines  

Antheia and Olon established this partnership in 2022 to leverage Olon’s fermentation sites across Italy. Olon has since played a pivotal role as a CDMO...
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Blog Posts

Introducing Walter Tamulis, Senior Staff Engineer, MSAT

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Press Releases

Antheia Completes Successful Product Validation

Company's first full-scale fermentation run reinforces commercial viability for a robust pipeline of Biosynthetic KSMS and APIs...
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Industry News

Out to revamp plant-based drug manufacturing, Antheia locks in partnership with synthetic biology…

With supply chain shortages at the forefront of nearly every business in the world right now, whether it be chicken wings or CAR-T cell therapy,...
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Industry News

Biomanufacturing draws hundreds of millions in investments

Fundraising at Bota Bio, Genomatica, and Antheia signals an upshift for commercial-scale synthetic biology......
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Industry News

Antheia Raises $73M in Series B

Antheia, a Menlo Park CA-based synthetic biology company, raised $73M in Series B funding. The round was led by Viking Global Investors with participation from...
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Industry News

Antheia Secures $73M in Series B

Antheia, a synthetic biology company working to develop plant-inspired medicine, has officially secured a fresh $73 million in Series B funding......
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Industry News

Antheia raises $73 million for drugs from reprogrammed yeast

Antheia, a synthetic biology company cofounded and led by Stanford University bioengineer Christina Smolke, has raised $73 million in series B financing......
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Industry News

The Funded: Accel and three unicorns score jumbo deals at midweek

Antheia Inc., Menlo Park, $73 million: Viking Global Investors led the Series B funding of this company that's making plant-based medicines using synthetic biology. Sherpalo...
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Blog Posts

Meet the Team – Our RA, Cat Cleto

We’re excited for the next interview in our “Meet the Team” series! We hear from Cat Cleto, a Fermentation Research Associate, on her path from...
Read More
Blog Posts

Antheia at SynBioBeta 2020

Earlier this month, my cofounder Kristy Hawkins and I presented at SynBioBeta 2020, the flagship conference for the synthetic biology community. This year’s virtual event...
Read More
Blog Posts

Meet the Team – Our Scientist, Ken Takeoka

As a part of our new “Meet the Team” series, we hear from Ken Takeoka, Antheia’s very first employee and a Scientist III. Read on...
Read More
Blog Posts

A Milestone for Drug Manufacturing and Synthetic Biology: Stanford Research Published in Nature

It’s a momentous day for my research team at Stanford University. Today, we’ve announced a new paper published in Nature that describes the first successful...
Read More
Blog Posts

Three plant-based pharmaceuticals: taxol, scopolamine and buprenorphine

Over the last 150 years, the pharmaceutical industry has focused on decoupling the production of medicinal compounds from their sources in the natural world, which...
Read More
Blog Posts

As Featured in STAT: The pharma supply chain is broken. Synthetic biology could fix it.

We started Antheia four years ago with a steadfast commitment to help build a more robust drug supply chain – one that delivers the right...
Read More

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Richard Sherwin

Head of Commercialization

Richard is an industry veteran with more than 30 years of experience in the KSM, API, and intermediate markets. He is responsible for leading the commercialization and revenue generation for Antheia’s robust pipeline of products. Richard brings an exceptional track record of leading international sales teams, driving revenue growth, building strategic partnerships, and delivering innovative products to market, including ANDA and NDA developments. Richard led commercial efforts at some of the leading global pharmaceutical companies and most recently, built his own consultancy business advising a range of clients, including $1B divisions of major multinationals.

Appropriate regulatory submissions will be prepared and submitted to support Antheia’s customers who need to reference and access necessary process-related information.

Yihui Zhu, PhD

Head of Fermentation

Yihui leads the fermentation team at Antheia. With over 25 years of hands-on experience in the field, he brings in-depth knowledge and expertise in microbial metabolism and fermentation process development. He is also skilled in developing comprehensive fermentation data collection, analysis, and visualization systems. Prior to joining Antheia, he served as a fermentation lead at Intrexon and Codexis where he successfully built fermentation labs and teams and led multiple biofuel and biochemical projects to reach stretch milestones and tech transfer. Yihui is passionate about the potential of fermentation and is dedicated to advancing the field through innovative research and development.

Yen-Hsiang Wang, PhD

Head of Strategy, Partnerships, and Finance

Yen-Hsiang leads strategy, partnerships and finance at Antheia. He completed his M.S. and Ph.D. in Bioengineering at Stanford, with extensive research experience in synthetic biology, metabolic engineering and computational modeling. Before joining Antheia, he worked at McKinsey and Tencent with a strong focus in corporate strategy and big data/advanced analytics. At Tencent, he served as Director of Strategy and Business Development for the AI Lab, leading corporate initiatives in healthcare AI/ML applications and commercialization. He also served in AI4H (Artificial Intelligence for Health), a collaboration between WHO and ITU, to establish global standards for AI in healthcare.

Audrey Wang

Head of Financial Planning and Analysis

Audrey leads financial planning and analysis at Antheia. With an MBA from Washington University in St. Louis, Audrey is passionate about leveraging financial analysis, digital technology, and data analytics to guide companies in making optimal investments and strategic business decisions. Audrey has a decade of experience in helping companies solve unique problems and creating long-term impact with unconventional approaches. Before joining Antheia, she was at Vir Biotechnology and Merck where she led various FP&A workstreams, including investment valuation, asset prioritization, and manufacturing sites operation finance support. Audrey completed CFA Level II and passed the U.S. CPA exam in 2011.

Antonij Tjahjadi, CPA

Head of Accounting

Antonij Tjahjadi leads accounting at Antheia and holds active CPA license. He joined Antheia with more than 20 years of experience in corporate accounting, bringing deep expertise in ramping up accounting operations for start-up companies, SEC reporting/technical accounting, and SOX implementation efforts. Before joining Antheia, he held various leading roles in both public and private company settings, including directing accounting functions at Ambys Medicines, where he successfully implemented Netsuite with Point Purchasing integration and set up various accounting policies and processes, and played a key role in the initial public offering of Nutanix, Inc.

Ken Takeoka

Head of Biology

Ken leads the Biology team at Antheia, which incorporates both strain and protein engineering functions. He has more than 16 years of experience in the synthetic biology field, working with leading companies, including Amyris and Novartis. One of his passions is molecular biology tool development and he previously worked to build the foundation for the automated strain engineering pipeline at Amyris. At Novartis, he modernized the molecular biology techniques and established a platform to model mechanisms of antibiotic resistance in a range of organisms.

Suzanne Sato

Head of Downstream Processing

Suzy leads downstream chemistry processes at Antheia. She has 19 years of experience in process development, including route development through synthetic chemistry and scale-up of small molecule APIs for GPCR targets under cGMP for Phase I-III trials. Before joining Antheia, Suzy led a full DSP team at Amyris where she successfully pivoted developments from biofuels hydrocarbon products to pharmaceutical intermediate, flavor, fragrance and nutraceutical products. She led a team that scaled 11 products and took five products to commercial manufacturing.

Farrah Pulce, PMP

Head of Project Management

Farrah leads program and project management at Antheia. She has over 20 years of experience leading program and project management, operations, and engineering for companies across the CPG, aerospace, and automotive industries. Prior to joining Antheia, Farrah implemented and led the sustaining program management team at Impossible Foods. She also led product operations, project management, and cost optimization at Blue Bottle Coffee and Tyson Foods to develop and commercialize new products. As a certified project management professional (PMP), Farrah has a proven record of successful project delivery, improving project management practices, and building collaborative teams.

Jordyn Lee

Head of Communications

Jordyn leads communications and external affairs at Antheia. She brings a decade of multidisciplinary communications experience in helping companies make complex science and technology accessible to broad audiences, all while maintaining technical accuracy and integrity. She has a passion for visionary storytelling and translating impact across the entire communications ecosystem – her work has spanned from public relations to corporate communications to marketing. Jordyn has served as an advisor to a number of different life sciences companies and most recently led corporate communications at Amyris.

Ben Kotopka, PhD

Head of Data Science

As Head of Data Science at Antheia, Ben manages in-house software development and external partnerships for storing and interpreting research data, executing bioinformatics analyses, and streamlining business processes. Prior to Antheia, Ben worked as an academic researcher at the intersection of machine learning, bioinformatics, and synthetic biology. Following this, as an entrepreneur and consultant, he developed and deployed data science solutions for biotechnology applications ranging from metabolomics-driven compound discovery to MRI segmentation.

Guerin Kob

Head of Supply Chain

Guerin is responsible for leading the design, development, management and improvement of Antheia’s end-to-end global supply chain. He has over 15 years of experience leading high-performing supply chain and procurement teams at leading biotechnology and specialty chemical companies, with extensive experience in process development and end-to-end supply chain optimization. Prior to joining Antheia, Guerin served as Senior Director of Global Supply Chain for Sumitomo Chemical’s biotechnology division with Valent Biosciences, where he led the end-to end supply chain including procurement, logistics and distribution, integrated business planning, materials management, customer service, and supply planning functions globally.

Eric d'Esparbes

Chief Financial Officer

Eric is a seasoned executive with 30 years of experience serving as the Chief Financial Officer for both private and public companies across various industries, including pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, diagnostics, and energy. He has successfully built and managed finance organizations for companies with a broad international footprint and annual sales of up to $3.5 billion. Eric has a proven track record in investor relations, capital raising to support organic growth and strategic partnerships/M&A, optimizing capital structures, and managing IPO processes, including transitions from private to public companies.

Jesse Ahrendt

Head of Quality Assurance and Regulatory Affairs

Jesse has more than 25 years of experience in regulatory affairs, quality systems, manufacturing quality, and regulated industries, ranging from early- to late-stage pharmaceuticals, biomanufacturing, consumer care, and medical devices. He has supported global product launches and the underlying quality supply chain components in industries that require strict adherence to internationally accepted quality standards. Before Antheia, he led quality efforts at Zymergen and Sandoz, and supported many global pharmaceutical companies during his time in Biotech Consulting at NSF International, all to bring quality to the forefront in manufacturing, standardize global processes, and support customer regulatory requirements.

Heidi Pucel

Chief People Officer

Heidi is a results-driven human resources executive and HR business partner who leverages decades of experience in empowering, motivating, and inspiring to drive transformation within high-performing and rapidly-growing workforces. A certified executive coach and passionate advocate for people-oriented solutions, Pucel serves as a partner to executive teams to design programs that support employee development, engagement, and recruitment and retention. Pucel most recently served as Chief People Officer for Countsy, where she worked as an interim HR executive for clients in the biotechnology and software industries, such as Ceribell and Tune Therapeutics.

Zack McGahey

Chief Operating Officer

Zack is a leading executive in operations management, specializing in bioprocess engineering and manufacturing management. He has over 20 years of experience leading manufacturing functions for companies across the pharmaceutical, synthetic biology, diagnostics, and automotive industries. Before joining Antheia, Zack was VP of manufacturing and capex project management at Zymergen. He also gained experience managing commercial scale facilities operations for Tesla, where he was responsible for managing 10 million square feet of factory, lab and warehouse space during the Model 3 ramp.

Kristy Hawkins, PhD

Co-Founder & CSO

Kristy has over 20 years of experience in the field of synthetic biology, focusing on yeast metabolic engineering for the production of small molecules. She did the founding work on the benzylisoquinoline alkaloid pathway during her graduate studies and gained valuable industry experience at Amyris and Lygos. Kristy is an expert in tool development, high-throughput screening, and host strain and heterologous pathway engineering.

Christina Smolke, PhD

Co-Founder & CEO

Christina is a pioneer in synthetic biology and metabolic engineering, where she has over 20 years of experience. As Professor of Bioengineering and Chemical Engineering at Stanford University, her laboratory led the breakthrough research to engineer baker’s yeast to produce some of the most complex and valuable medicines known. Under her leadership, Antheia’s synthetic biology platform enables new possibilities for drug discovery and efficient, sustainable, transparent, and on-demand drug manufacturing at scale. Her vision and accomplishments have garnered numerous awards, including the Chan-Zuckerberg Biohub Investigator, NIH Director’s Pioneer Award, Nature’s 10, Novozymes Award for Excellence in Biochemical Engineering, and TR35 Award.

Antheia Appoints Eric d’Esparbes as CFO

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Appropriate regulatory submissions will be prepared and submitted to support Antheia’s customers who need to reference and access necessary process-related information.