About Us

Mike is President and Chief Executive Officer of Sionna. He is a respected biotech leader with over 20 years of biopharma experience across global organizations. Most recently he served as Chief Operating Officer at Sage Therapeutics leading all the business functions (commercial, medical affairs, government affairs, business development, technical operations, strategy and program management) and G&A functions. During his four years with Sage, he helped lead the growth of the organization through multiple capital raises, the launch of the company’s first product, and execution of a transformational, multi-billion dollar collaboration.

Prior to Sage, he had a 14-year tenure at Biogen in various business and commercial roles. His most recent role at Biogen was as Senior Vice President, U.S. Commercial, where he was the general manager of the multi-billion dollar MS, hemophilia, and SMA franchises. Prior to Biogen, Mike worked at Bain & Company as a consultant specializing in healthcare. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of bluebird bio. Mike earned his MBA from the Darden Graduate School of Business Administration at the University of Virginia and a B.A. from College of the Holy Cross.

Charlotte is Sionna’s Chief Medical Officer. She has over 20 years of drug development experience, most recently serving as the VP of CF and Alpha-1 Antitrypsin Deficiency Clinical Development at Vertex, where she was instrumental in bringing the CFTR modulators Trikafta/Kaftrio^®, Symdeko/Symkevi^® and Orkambi^® to CF patients and expanding indications across the CF portfolio. Prior to Vertex she was VP and Head of Clinical Development at Infinity Pharmaceuticals after having held positions of increasing responsibility at Tolerx and Wyeth Research (now Pfizer), working across multiple therapeutic areas and modalities.

Prior to her career in industry, Charlotte was a faculty member in the pulmonary and critical care division at Brigham and Women’s Hospital/Harvard Medical School where she cared for CF patients and specialized in lung transplantation and translational research. She obtained her undergraduate degree from Harvard University and her M.D. from Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons, and completed internal medicine training and pulmonary and critical care fellowship at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

Elena is Chief Financial Officer & Head of Corporate Development of Sionna. She has over 20 years of experience in finance and the life sciences industry. Most recently she served as Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer for Acadia Pharmaceuticals where she was responsible for leading the corporate finance, accounting, investor relations, corporate affairs and government affairs functions. During her tenure at Acadia, Elena played a critical role in the organization’s commercial, business development and pipeline growth including successfully raising $600 million in capital.

Prior to Acadia, Elena was Vice President, Investor Relations at Alexion Pharmaceuticals and served as a member of the Operating Committee. Additionally, Elena was Chief Executive Officer of BIOVISIO, an independent consulting firm serving the life sciences industry. She was also a Managing Director at Maverick Capital, a hedge fund, and was responsible for investments in the biotechnology, pharmaceutical and life science sectors. She currently serves on the Board of Directors of Kronos Bio, Inc. and Kymera Therapeutics, Inc. Elena received her B.A. in history and sociology of science from the University of Pennsylvania. She is also a CFA© charterholder.

Vanya is Sionna’s Chief People Officer. She has over 15 years of experience as a strategic business partner and operational leader focused on people and culture. She is passionate about attracting, retaining and developing world-class teams while putting the employee experience front and center.

Most recently Vanya served as Chief People Officer of Affinivax where she was responsible for all aspects of Human Resources. She led Affinivax and the people function through pivotal transformation and a successful merger with GSK. Prior to Affinivax, Vanya served as Chief Human Resources Officer of Sigilon Therapeutics during a period of rapid growth and a transition from a private to a post-IPO organization. Prior to Sigilon, Vanya held various leadership positions at Biogen as a business partner, talent acquisition leader and in HR operations. Before joining industry, she held leadership positions at Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham Women’s Hospital, and Harvard Medical School, focusing on training and education, program management, and operations. Vanya earned a Master of Public Administration, Health Policy and Management Emphasis from Suffolk University and a B.A. in Counseling from Dominion College.

Greg is co-founder of Sionna and serves as Senior Vice President of Discovery Research. Formerly, he was the Head of Protein Conformational Diseases and Rare Pulmonary Diseases Research at Sanofi Genzyme. Greg’s research has led to a novel strategy for discovering small molecules that directly address the molecular pathology of the most common cystic fibrosis-causing mutation, ∆F508-CFTR. He was the Principal Investigator for $32 million in grant funding from the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation Therapeutics Development Initiative to support CF drug discovery and preclinical development.

Greg also served as an adjunct faculty member in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Pharmacology at the University of Massachusetts Medical School. Greg received his Ph.D. in cell and molecular biology from Université Paris XI (Paris-Saclay), where he graduated summa cum laude for research performed at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School. Greg received a B.S. in biology from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

Mark is a co-founder of Sionna and serves as Vice President of Medicinal Chemistry. He has nearly 30 years of experience creating biopharmaceutical drugs. Formerly, he was the U.S. head of medicinal chemistry at Sanofi where he oversaw a diverse group of scientists that advanced forward multiple development candidates in oncology and rare disease. He also contributed to several external partnerships including Principia, MyoKardia, Lead Pharma, and DiCE.

Mark was a founding member of Array Biopharma (acquired by Pfizer) where he led several programs into clinical development (ARRY-797, ARRY-382 and pexmetinib). He began his career at Amgen where he created and led the highspeed synthesis group. Mark received his Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of Minnesota and his B.S. from Macalester College.

Meghan is the VP of Programs, Portfolio and Operations for Sionna. She brings over 15 years of experience in strategic operations and planning, program leadership, medical affairs and scientific communications. Most recently Meghan was Vice President at Sage Therapeutics, where she held multiple leadership positions including Head of Program, Portfolio and Alliance Management and Head of Medical Communications & Operations. Meghan has previously held positions within small and large companies including Infinity Pharmaceuticals and Takeda Pharmaceuticals.

She began her career within academia, managing research teams at Dana Farber Cancer Institute and University of California San Francisco. Meghan received her B.A. in chemistry from Smith College.

Andy is Vice President of Information and Technology for Sionna. He has over 25 years of experience across IT in the biopharmaceutical industry, building and scaling infrastructure with a focus on R&D. Most recently he served as Executive Director, Head of IT at H3 Biomedicine, where he established a new unified IT team, architecture and portfolio management approach.

Andy previously held various technology and business capability leadership positions with companies including Biogen, Amgen, Bristol Myers Squibb, Accenture, Hospira, and Pfizer. He earned a B.A. in Business Information Systems from Southern New Hampshire University.

Alison is Sionna’s Vice President of Preclinical Safety and has over 20 years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry. She is responsible for preclinical safety studies required to support the Sionna discovery and development portfolios.  

Prior to Sionna, Alison spent three years at Praxis Precision Medicines where she supported multiple programs spanning early discovery and late-stage clinical development. She started her career in 2002 at AstraZeneca U.K. as an electrophysiologist within the safety pharmacology group before moving to the U.S. and advancing to a program-focused general discovery toxicology role. This was followed by four years at Biogen where she was a program toxicologist on a variety of small and large molecule programs for CNS and immunology indications. 

Alison received her Ph.D. in Molecular Pharmacology from the University of Birmingham, U.K. and is a Diplomate of the American Board of Toxicology.

Jen is SVP, General Counsel for Sionna. She brings nearly 20 years of experience advising biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies through significant clinical, regulatory and business development milestones, product launches, and capital raises.

Prior to Sionna, Jen served as VP, Corporate Counsel at Sage Therapeutics, where she built and led a team providing legal counsel and contracting support across the organization and her responsibilities spanned complex corporate transactions, securities law compliance, corporate governance, employment law matters, and investor engagement. She previously served as VP, Corporate Counsel at Aegerion Pharmaceuticals and as Corporate Counsel at AVEO Pharmaceuticals and PerkinElmer.

Jen began her legal career at Bingham McCutchen, representing public and private life sciences companies. She earned a J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law and a B.A. from Middlebury College.

Mara is the Senior Vice President and Head of Global Regulatory Affairs and Quality for Sionna. She is an accomplished drug development professional with substantial experience in regulatory affairs and global R&D strategy. Prior to Sionna, she was the Head of Regulatory Affairs for Apellis Pharmaceuticals, where she led the team to deliver the company’s first global marketing authorizations.

She previously held senior positions at Shire Pharmaceuticals in both Regulatory Affairs and R&D Business Operations, where she focused on due diligence assessments for in-licensed assets across therapeutic areas. In her earlier roles at Amicus Therapeutics and Cato Research, she advanced multiple rare disease programs through early and mid-stage development. Mara holds a master’s degree in biochemistry from Duke University and earned Regulatory Affairs Certification.

Mike is Vice President, CMC at Sionna and has 20 years of development experience in the pharmaceutical industry. Prior to Sionna, Mike was CMC lead for ALKS-1140 at Alkermes after their acquisition of Rodin Therapeutics. At Rodin, Mike was responsible for all aspects of CMC for Rodin’s clinical CoREST-selective HDAC inhibitors.

Mike spent 6 years at Constellation Pharmaceuticals where he was a medicinal chemist on the Pelabresib/CPI-0610 team (currently in Phase 3), project manager for the CPI-1205 IND and a CMC leader for CPI-0610 and CPI-1205. He began his career at Sepracor/Sunovion as a medicinal chemist and was an inventor of Ulotaront/SEP-363856, currently in Phase 3 clinical trials for Schizophrenia.

Mike received his Ph.D. in organic chemistry from MIT and his A.B. in chemistry from the College of the Holy Cross.

Maria is the VP, DMPK for Sionna. In this position, Maria is responsible for setting criteria and enabling modeling that supports lead optimization and advancing molecules to safety studies and IND filing.

Maria has extensive experience with early discovery projects across multiple therapeutic areas including HIV, central nervous system, cardiovascular, inflammation, and oncology, providing leadership around development programs from early clinical operations and medical writing to data management functions. She most recently served as a consultant for project out-licensing at Novo Nordisk and has previously held positions with FORMA Therapeutics, Ironwood Pharmaceuticals, and Boehringer-Ingelheim. Maria also has experience as a research scientist with AstraZeneca and DuPont Pharmaceuticals. She earned a Ph.D. in renal physiology and philosophy from Georgia State University and holds a B.S. in biology/chemistry from The University of Alabama in Huntsville.

Heather is the VP, Development Operations for Sionna. In this position, Heather is responsible for the clinical operations, medical writing and data management functions, providing leadership around the company’s development programs.

Heather has a long track record in clinical development, with a focus on building and leading clinical operations and data management teams.  Widely recognized as a leader in the space, she has been a key member of both large and small companies including Decibel Therapeutics, Infinity Pharmaceuticals, Millennium/Takeda Pharmaceuticals, Accenture (ACE), Wyeth Pharmaceuticals, Synta Pharmaceuticals and Genetics Institute. She has been part of teams submitting INDs and other regulatory applications, as well as others successfully gaining FDA approval. Heather graduated from Skidmore College with a B.A. in English.