About
Company Overview
Rakovina Therapeutics, Inc. was founded in 2020 with a vision to transform and extend the lives of patients with cancer.
Our team has deep experience in drug discovery research, preclinical and clinical development and regulatory affairs necessary to advance breakthrough innovations to become potential life-changing treatments in the oncology field.
Our approach centers on using groundbreaking science to create new precision medicines targeting critical DNA damage repair pathway mutations that are the hallmarks of many cancers. We are committed to conducting innovative cutting-edge research with the aim of benefiting patients worldwide.
Rakovina Therapeutics is headquartered in Vancouver, Canada.
Mr. Bacha has been involved in pharmaceutical research and corporate development for more than 25 years as a member of the executive leadership team for multiple companies. Mr. Bacha is the founder and chief executive officer of Edison Oncology Holding Corp., a private corporation which sold assets to establish Rakovina Therapeutics Inc. Prior to founding Edison Oncology, Mr. Bacha co-founded Kintara Therapeutics (NASDAQ: KTRA, formerly DelMar Pharmaceuticals) with Dr. Dennis Brown and served as Chairman and CEO during the company’s growth including the advancement of its lead product candidate to pivotal Phase III clinical trials and NASDAQ listing. Mr. Bacha was served as president and founding CFO of XBiotech, Inc. (NASDAQ: XBIT), founding CEO of Inimex Pharmaceuticals and as of Vice President, Corporate Development at Inflazyme Corp. Programs advanced by Inimex and Inflazyme have become foundational in Soligenix, Inc. (NASDAQ: SNGX) and Aquinox Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: AQXP). He is a member of the National Brain Tumor Society Research Roundtable and the Board of the Leukemia Lymphoma Society of Canada. Mr. Bacha currently serves as a consultant to DelMar Pharmaceuticals and Valent Technologies LLC, and as a member of the Board of Directors of Sernova Corp. (TSX-V: SVA). Prior to taking on his operating roles, Mr. Bacha served Senior Manager and Director of KPMG Health Ventures, acting as an advisor to numerous public and private life sciences companies. Mr. Bacha holds an MBA (Hons) from the Goizueta Business School at Emory University (1995) and a degree in BioPhysics from the University of California, San Diego (1991). Mr. Bacha is the inventor or co-inventor on multiple issued U.S. patents and applications, many with foreign counterparts.
Dr. Brown has been involved in cancer drug discovery and development for more than 35 years. Initially with the Stanford Research Institute at Stanford University where he was involved in drug-screening activities sponsored by the US National Cancer Institute. Dr. Brown has founded or co-founded multiple companies including Matrix Pharmaceutical, Inc. (acquired by Chiron Corp. in 2002), Mountain View Pharmaceuticals, ChemGenex Pharmaceuticals (acquired by Cephalon/Teva in 2011) and Kintara Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: KTRA, formerly DelMar Pharmaceuticals). During his career, Dr. Brown has been involved in the discovery and development of multiple FDA-approved cancer therapies. He currently serves as a member of the National Brain Tumor Society Research Roundtable, as a consultant to DelMar Pharmaceuticals, as Chairman of Mountain View Pharmaceutical’s Board of Directors and is the President of Valent Technologies LLC, which supported the discovery and development of Edison Oncology’s drug candidates. Dr. Brown served as an Assistant Professor of Radiology at Harvard University Medical School and as a Research Associate in Radiology at Stanford University Medical School. He received his B.A. in Biology and Chemistry (1971), M.S. in Cell Biology (1975) and Ph.D. in Radiation and Cancer Biology (1979), all from New York University. Dr. Brown is an inventor of more than 40 issued U.S. patents and applications, many with foreign counterparts.
Mr. De Lucrezia is an experienced businessman who has founded a number of publicly listed companies. From 2013 – 2016, Mr. Delucrezia was CEO, CFO, President and Director of Manera Capital Corp. (now GT Gold Corp.). He also founded Califfi Capital Corp., and has been its CEO since 2017, as well as Vincero Capital Corp, also serving as its CEO since 2019. Mr. Delucrezia has been a director and/or officer for reporting issuers over the past 25 years, culminating in a wealth of experience in board management, company growth, and strategy. Currently, Mr. Delucrezia manages a multi-million dollar real estate and business portfolio of private companies.
Mr. Liggett brings 30 years of experience in the health care sector at public and private companies including Ico Therapeutics, Naegis Pharmaceuticals and Inflazyme Pharmaceuticals, where he provided leadership through multiple financings and other strategic initiatives before successfully transitioning the company to establish its footprint in the forestry sector as Eacom Timber. During his career, Mr. Liggett has completed more than $300 million in equity and debt financings and closed more than $200 million in acquisition transactions. Prior to his operating roles, Mr. Liggett was a practicing pharmacist for 7 years before obtaining his training and certification as a Chartered Accountant after spending 7 years at Price Waterhouse Coopers (then Price Waterhouse).
Senior Management
Dr. Mads Daugaard (President and CSO, Rakovina Therapeutics) is a recognized world leader in the field of translational cancer research with strong expertise in DNA-damage response mechanisms and therapeutics targeting DNA integrity. He is a Senior Research Scientist and the Head of the Molecular Pathology and Cell Imaging Unit at the Vancouver Prostate Centre, and an associate Professor at Department of Urologic Sciences at University of British Columbia. Dr. Daugaard has published original research in top-tier peer-reviewed scientific journals (e.g., Nature Structural & Molecular Biology, Nature Communications, Cancer Cell, and Molecular Cell). He has previously co-founded the cancer therapeutics company VAR2 Pharmaceuticals (2012) and the cancer diagnostic company VarCT Diagnostics (2017), and served as CSO for VAR2 Pharmaceuticals (2012-2016).
Dr. Langlands is the principal of Langlands & Associates Consulting Inc. and brings over 25 years of experience in the preclinical and clinical development of new pharmaceuticals. Dr. Langlands has held senior preclinical and clinical research roles at Naegis Pharmaceuticals and Kintara Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: KTRA, formerly DelMar Pharmaceuticals) and Inflazyme Pharmaceuticals where he has been responsible for preclinical research, regulatory strategies and early clinical development programs required to obtain proof of value for future project development. Dr. Langlands was previously Program Authority and Senior Lecturer for postgraduate training in Pharmaceutical Medicine & Drug Development UNSW in Sydney, Australia. Dr. Langlands obtained his Ph.D. in pharmacology from the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, UK.
David Hyman is a Chartered Accountant and Chartered Business Valuator with over 20 years of experience in financial & economic analysis for public and private enterprises in addition to financial governance and public accounting. Mr. Hyman is currently a contract CFO with Tandem Innovation Group where he provides fractional CFO services to small and medium size businesses. Prior thereto, Mr. Hyman previously served as CFO of TheraCann International, a cannabis technology and consulting company with international operations. Mr. Hyman has also served as the CFO and a Board Member of a TSX-V shell company (HAW Capital Corp.) that completed an RTO transaction with GOLO Mobile Inc. Prior to TheraCann, David was CFO of Merrco Payments Inc., a private payment processing company and prior thereto was Vice President at Camcor Partners Ltd., an energy focused private equity firm. Mr. Hyman holds a B.Comm from the University of Calgary.
Advisors
Dr. Brown has been involved in cancer drug discovery and development for more than 35 years. Initially with the Stanford Research Institute at Stanford University where he was involved in drug-screening activities sponsored by the US National Cancer Institute. Dr. Brown has founded or co-founded multiple companies including Matrix Pharmaceutical, Inc. (acquired by Chiron Corp. in 2002), Mountain View Pharmaceuticals, ChemGenex Pharmaceuticals (acquired by Cephalon/Teva in 2011) and Kintara Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: KTRA, formerly DelMar Pharmaceuticals). During his career, Dr. Brown has been involved in the discovery and development of multiple FDA-approved cancer therapies. He currently serves as a member of the National Brain Tumor Society Research Roundtable, as a consultant to DelMar Pharmaceuticals, as Chairman of Mountain View Pharmaceutical’s Board of Directors and is the President of Valent Technologies LLC, which supported the discovery and development of Edison Oncology’s drug candidates. Dr. Brown served as an Assistant Professor of Radiology at Harvard University Medical School and as a Research Associate in Radiology at Stanford University Medical School. He received his B.A. in Biology and Chemistry (1971), M.S. in Cell Biology (1975) and Ph.D. in Radiation and Cancer Biology (1979), all from New York University. Dr. Brown is an inventor of more than 40 issued U.S. patents and applications, many with foreign counterparts.
Dr. Post brings more than 35 years of drug development and leadership experience in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry spanning companies of all sizes. He currently serves as member of the board of directors and chief scientific officer of Vivace Pharmaceuticals. Previously, he served as chief scientific officer of BioMarin, a publicly held biopharmaceutical firm with a focus on rare diseases. He joined BioMarin when the company acquired LEAD Therapeutics, where he was chief scientific officer where he was responsible for the development of the blockbuster PARP inhibitor talazoparib until it was sold to Medivation, Inc. and ultimately commercialized by Pfizer, Inc. following the $14 billion acquisition of Medivation, Inc.. Positions prior to LEAD included senior vice president of research and development for Onyx Pharmaceuticals and vice president of discovery research for Parke-Davis Pharmaceuticals. Dr. Post holds a doctorate in biochemistry from the University of Wisconsin and a B.S. in Chemistry from the University of Michigan.
Dr. Sankar received his training in clinical research and tumor biology from NCI Bethesda Maryland and since has held Clinical development positions within leading Biotech/Pharma including Genentech, Medimmune, Pharmacyclis, Fiveprime, Otsuka,Portola, CBT Pharmaceuticals, LSK biopharma and Rhizen Pharmaceuticals. As an expert in providing global clinical development and regulatory strategies for therapeutic drugs, Dr Sankar has acted as clinical lead in numerous phase I, II and III clinical trials. He is and was instrumental in filing the New Drug Applications for the antibody-drug conjugate Kadcyla and the B cell receptor signaling kinase inhibitor Ibrutinib. He has extensive experience in the application of US Food and Drug Administration regulations and the Good Clinical Practice guidelines set forth by the International Council on Harmonization of Technical Requirements for Registration of Pharmaceuticals for Human Use. Dr. Sankar is an active member of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), the American Society of Hematology (ASH), the European Hematology Association (EHA) , Drug information association (DIA) , European society of clinical oncology (ESMO), American association for cancer research (AACR), Enterprising Pharmaceutical Professionals from the Indian Sub-Continent (EPPIC GLOBAL), Connective Tissue Oncology Society (CTOS), and TiE Silicon Valley. Neil Sankar received his MD degree from Bangalore university and internal medicine residency from Univ of West indies, Kingston, Jamaica and trained in UK and the Caribbean. He also holds a postgraduate degree in public health from Queensland University in Australia.
Dr. Shen is the inventor of the kt-2000, kt-3000 and kt-4000 families of drug candidates under development by Rakovina Therapeutics. Dr. Shen is founder and chief executive officer of Viva Vision Biotech, an ophthalmology company based in Shanghai, China. Dr. Shen has more than 20 years of drug discovery and project management experiences in large pharmaceutical companies such as Abbott, Amgen, Sunesis and KanionUSA. He is the principle inventor of Lifitegrast (SAR1118), a potent LFA-1 inhibitor, approved by FDA to treat dry eye disease. He also made an important contribution to Venetoclax (ABT-199/GDC-0199), a selective BCL-2 inhibitor, approved by FDA in 2016 to treat certain types of leukemia. He is the co-author of over 40 peer-reviewed publications and co-inventor of over 40 patents. Dr. Shen received his B.S. in chemistry from Fudan University and Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from Pittsburgh University with Professor Dennis P. Curran. Dr. Shen completed his postdoctoral training in Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center with Prof. Samuel J. Danishefsky.