Health Care Tech, Biopharma Companies Get New Legal Execs
Waltham, Massachusetts-based Kala Pharmaceuticals, which currently is focused on technology to treat eye diseases, has named Eric Trachtenberg as general counsel and corporate secretary. SomaLogic Inc. of Boulder, Colorado, has appointed Melody Harris as the health tech company's chief legal officer.
April 06, 2018 at 01:24 PM
3 minute read
Melody Harris.
A pair of health care startups have new top lawyers.
Kala Pharmaceuticals Inc. has named Eric Trachtenberg as general counsel and corporate secretary, while SomaLogic Inc. has appointed Melody Harris as the health tech company's chief legal officer.
Trachtenberg has a nearly 15-year in-house career at various life sciences companies, including Kos Pharmaceuticals Inc.; Sunovion Pharmaceuticals Inc. (formerly Sepracor Inc.); Enobia Pharma Corp.; and Auxilium Pharmaceuticals Inc., according to his LinkedIn profile. Most recently, he served as GC, chief compliance officer and corporate secretary at Aralez Pharmaceuticals Inc. (formerly Pozen Inc.)
He began his legal career as an associate at Blank Rome, where he remained for six years before his first in-house gig as senior counsel at Kos Pharmaceuticals in 2005 before it was acquired by Abbott.
At Waltham, Massachusetts-based Kala, Trachtenberg will oversee all of the company's legal and compliance functions and serve on its executive committee.
A company spokesperson did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment Friday morning about Trachtenberg's hire, including whether he is the first person to hold the top lawyer position at the company.
Kala is a recent biotech IPO focused on the development and commercialization of nanoparticle-based mucus-penetrating particles to treat eye diseases. While currently focused on ocular issues, including the treatment of inflammation and pain following eye surgery, the proprietary technology can be applied to other therapies.
Trachtenberg holds an undergraduate management degree from Tulane University and both law and MBA degrees from Temple University.
SomaLogic's Harris succeeds a retiring Steven Morrissett. She joins the Boulder, Colorado-based company from Qualcomm Life Inc., a digital health business subsidiary of Qualcomm Technologies Inc. There, she led the legal, global privacy and quality, regulatory and compliance groups as vice president and chief counsel, according to the company.
Prior to that position, Harris held a variety of senior leadership roles, including president and GC at an international IP management firm, executive VP and GC at an international software development and consulting firm, and senior IP counsel to USWest/Qwest.
SomaLogic develops and commercializes consumer wellness and diagnostics products through a technology that identifies changes in proteins that make up the human body. In January, it closed a $200 million financing round led by Chinese health care firm iCarbonX, which last year announced a $161 million equity investment in the company.
“SomaLogic is bringing together a unique technology and business plan to entirely change how people worldwide manage their personal health,” Harris said in a statement announcing her appointment.
Harris holds degrees from the University of Denver and Harvard Law School.
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