Board of Directors

Dr. Glickman has served as Chairman of ESSA’s board of directors since October 2010, and is responsible for the management of the board of directors to ensure ESSA has appropriate objectives, an effective strategy and is operating in accordance with a high standard of corporate governance. Dr. Glickman presently serves as the CEO and Chairman of the Board of Aurinia Pharmaceuticals. He was also a co-founder, Chairman and CEO of Aspreva Pharmaceuticals Inc. Prior to establishing Aspreva, Dr. Glickman was the co-founder and CEO of StressGen Biotechnologies Corporation. Dr. Glickman currently serves on the board of directors of Cardiome, Vida Pharmaceuticals and Engene Inc., and is Chairman of the board of directors of Aurinia Pharmaceuticals Inc. In addition, Dr. Glickman has served on many other biotechnology boards of directors. Dr. Glickman received the 2004 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award for the Pacific Region Life Sciences Group, both Canada’s and British Columbia’s Top 40 under 40 Award for Entrepreneurs, the 2006 BC Biotech Leadership Award and the Lupus Foundation of America Leadership Award.

Dr. Parkinson has served as President and Chief Executive Officer of ESSA Pharma Inc. since January 2016, and as a Director of the company since June 2015. Prior to joining ESSA he had been a Venture Partner at New Enterprise Associates, Inc. From 2007 until 2012, Dr. Parkinson served as President and CEO of Nodality, Inc., a biotechnology company focused on the biological characterization of signaling pathways in patients with malignancy. Until October 2007 he was SVP, Oncology Research and Development at Biogen Idec, where he oversaw all oncology discovery research efforts and the development of the oncology pipeline. Previously he had served as VP, Oncology Development, at Amgen and VP, Global Clinical Oncology Development, at Novartis. In those roles he oversaw the successful clinical development of a series of cancer therapeutics, including Gleevec, Zometa, Femara, and Vectibix. Dr. Parkinson worked at the National Cancer Institute from 1990 to 1997, serving as Chief of the Investigational Drug Branch and then as Acting Associate Director of the Cancer Therapy Evaluation Program (CTEP). He is a past Chairman of the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) Biologics Advisory Committee, a past member of the FDA Science Board, and is a recipient of the FDA’s Cody Medal. He is a past editor of the Journal of Immunotherapy and past president of the Society of Biological Therapy. He has served on the National Cancer Policy Forum of the Institute of Medicine and is a past co-chair of the Cancer Steering Committee of the NIH Foundation Biomarkers Consortium. A past Board Director of the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research, he currently serves as a Board Director for the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation. He served as Chairperson of the American Association of Cancer Research (AACR) Finance and Audit Committee for 15 years and is a previous elected Board Director of AACR. Dr. Parkinson was a Director of Facet Biotech, Inc., until the acquisition by Abbott Pharmaceuticals, and was a Director of Ambit Biosciences until the acquisition by Daiichi Sankyo. He was also previously a Director at Threshold Pharmaceuticals and Cerulean Pharmaceuticals. He currently serves as Director on the Boards of Tocagen Inc (TOCA), 3SBio Inc (1530.HK), CTI Biopharma, Inc (CTIC), and is a Co-Founder and Director of Refuge Biotech, Inc. He has held academic positions both at Tufts and at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, and has authored over 100 peer-reviewed publications.

Mr. Berger spent 12 years in sell-side equity research, most recently as Managing Director, U.S. Equity Research at J. P. Morgan Securities, Inc. (“JPM”) from May 1998 to March 2003 where he was involved with the issuance of over $12 billion in biotechnology company equity or equity-linked securities. During his five years at as a Managing Director at JPM, he was involved with the issuance of over $12 billion in biotechnology company equity or equity-linked securities. The majority of these transactions were book-run and lead-managed by the JPM biotech team. He was associated with several notable financings in the biotechnology sector including the Genentech Inc. initial public offering, the first large Celgene Corporation financings as well as financings of several large-cap biotechnology companies in their rapid growth phase. His team covered 26 publicly-traded biotechnology companies. Mr. Berger began his career as a sell-side analyst at Josephthal & Co. in 1991, subsequently moving to Salomon Smith Barney in 1997 serving as Director, Equity Research and Senior Biotechnology Analyst. Mr. Berger currently serves on the board of directors of six other public biotechnology companies: Five Prime Therapeutics, Inc., Immune Design Corp., Bellus Health, Inc., Tocagen Inc., Protestasis Therapeutics, Inc., and Kezar Life Sciences, Inc.. Mr. Berger received an AB in International Relations from Johns Hopkins University, a MA in International Economics from Johns Hopkins University for Advanced International Studies and a MBA from Harvard University.

Mr. Martin is Chief Executive Officer of Palladio Biosciences, a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company developing medicines for orphan diseases of the kidney. He joined the ESSA Board in July 2019 following ESSA’s acquisition of Realm Therapeutics (NASDAQ: RLM) where he had served as Chief Executive Officer since 2015. Mr. Martin brings more than 25 years of experience in senior executive roles in the life science industry, with a focus on business development, operations, and raising capital. In his career he has served as Chief Executive Officer of Affectis Pharmaceuticals, President of moksha8, Chief Operating Officer of Intercept Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: ICPT) and Chief Finance Officer at Bioxell (SWX: BXLN). He began his career at SmithKline Beecham Pharmaceuticals where he held roles of increasing responsibility in marketing and strategic product development and later joined Novartis as Vice President, Global Business Development & Licensing. He is an active coach and mentor to other senior executives, and is a guest lecturer at Wharton and Columbia Business School on biotech, entrepreneurship, and financing . Mr. Martin holds a BA from Cornell University and an MBA from Harvard.

Mr. Requadt, LL.B, MBA, has served as a director of the Company since January 14, 2016.  He is currently Chief Executive Officer of Talaris Therapeutics, Inc., a privately-held, late-stage, cell therapy company.  He is also a Venture Partner at Blackstone Life Sciences.  Until October 2018, he was a Managing Director at Clarus, a life sciences investment capital fund. Mr. Requadt has over 18 years of operating and investment experience in the pharmaceutical industry. Prior to joining Clarus in 2005, Mr. Requadt was Director, Business Development of TransForm Pharmaceuticals, and previously practiced for several years as a mergers and acquisitions attorney at Davis Polk & Wardwell.  Before that, Mr. Requadt was a law clerk for a senior judge at the Supreme Court of Canada. Mr. Requadt holds a B.Com (Economics & Finance) from McGill University, an LL.B from University of Toronto and an MBA from Harvard Business School (Baker Scholar). He has previously served as a director or observer on the board of directors of AvroBio, Inc, VBI Vaccines, Inc., TyRx Inc., Catabasis Pharmaceuticals Inc., Oxford Immunotec Global PLC, Link Medicine Corp., Biolex Therapeutics Inc. and Edev S.a.r.l.

Mr. Sollis has served as an ESSA director since April 2012 and is a partner at the law firm of Dentons Canada LLP. He represents clients in the areas of corporate and securities law, with a focus on acquisitions, financings and reorganizations. He has acted for a variety of public and private companies in financing transactions, including public offerings, private placements of debt and equity, special warrant financings and public and private limited partnership offerings. Mr. Sollis has also assisted clients with takeover bids, mergers, proxy contests, spin-offs, joint ventures and acquisitions of private businesses. He received a Bachelor of Laws degree from Dalhousie University.

Ari Brettman is a Principal in the Blackstone Life Sciences group, having joined Blackstone as part of its acquisition of Clarus in December of 2018. Mr. Brettman joined Clarus in September 2014.

Dr. Brettman is focused on investments across the firm’s portfolio, including startups and partnerships with pharmaceutical companies. Prior to Clarus, Dr. Brettman completed a residency in internal medicine and a fellowship in cardiology at Massachusetts General Hospital. Dr. Brettman was also an NIH-sponsored post-doctoral fellow at the MGH Center for Systems Biology, where he studied the autophagy of lipid droplets and used electronic medical record-based big data analytics at Partners Healthcare to conduct clinical research and improve disease management. Dr. Brettman is a member of the Board of Directors of Praxis Precision Medicines, a startup in genetically defined neuropsychiatric disorders.

Dr. Brettman received his M.D. from Duke University and his AB in History and Science from Harvard College. While a medical student, he was a Sarnoff Cardiovascular Research Foundation Fellow at Stanford University, where he studied angiogenesis

Most recently Sandy Zweifach was the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Nuvelution Pharma, Inc. Previously, Mr. Zweifach was the Co-founder and CEO of Ascendancy Healthcare, Inc. He has also been a Partner at Reedland Capital Partners, CEO of Pathways Diagnostics, Managing Director and CFO of Bay City Capital, and President and CFO of Epoch Biosciences, which was acquired by Nanogen. Sandy currently serves as the Chair of Palladio Biosciences, Inc., Executive Chair of Janpix, Inc., Chair of IMIDomics SL, and Non-Executive Board Member of Compugen, Inc. (NASDAQ: CGEN) . He is also Sr Advisor to Nuvelution Pharma, Inc.  He received his BA in Biology from UC San Diego and an MS in Human Physiology from UC Davis.