SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif., June 03, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Aligos Therapeutics, Inc. (Aligos), a private biotechnology company focused on the development of targeted, antiviral therapies including chronic hepatitis B (CHB) and COVID-19 as well as therapeutics for NASH, today announced the appointment of Lesley Ann Calhoun as chief financial officer. Ms. Calhoun will serve as a member of the Aligos leadership team and will report to Aligos’ chief executive officer, Lawrence Blatt, Ph.D., MBA.

Ms. Calhoun is an experienced finance executive with 17 years in the biopharma industry as well as an earlier career in U.S. and multinational technology companies and public accounting. She brings broad experience in both public and pre-IPO companies and in driving financial vision, direction, guidance and compliance to support and advise on operations for companies. She has had a successful career in transforming companies from private, pre-IPO stages to publicly traded business driven, commercial operating companies.

“With Ms. Calhoun’s significant financial and business operations experience, we are pleased to welcome her to the team as we move our lead chronic hepatitis B candidates toward clinical development,” said Dr. Blatt. “She has led numerous companies through major periods of growth and finance planning activities, and I look forward to partnering with Lesley on executing our initiatives with a clear goal of developing a functional cure for patients with chronic hepatitis B.”

Prior to joining the Aligos team, Ms. Calhoun most recently served as senior vice president of finance & administration and chief accounting officer at Global Blood Therapeutics, where she was responsible for the finance, accounting and administrative functions aimed at supporting the companies’ transition from clinical stage to a publicly traded, commercial environment and was part of the company’s successful regulatory approval and commercial launch of Oxbryta® for the treatment of sickle cell disease. Previously, Ms. Calhoun served as vice president of finance at Hyperion Therapeutics Inc., a commercial stage biopharmaceutical company focused on orphan diseases. During her time there, she was instrumental in building the company’s finance infrastructure, which led to the successful commercialization of RAVICTI® for the treatment of urea cycle disorders. Prior to her time at Hyperion, she served as senior director of finance/corporate controller at Theravance, Inc., where she supported the company’s CFO and was responsible for all corporate and regulatory accounting reporting, serving as a key player in the company’s financial vision and direction.

Ms. Calhoun has also held roles of increasing financial responsibility at Cell Genesys, Inc., Snap Appliances, Inc., Inktomi Corporation and Silicon Graphics, Inc. and was a member of the audit practice of Deloitte & Touche LLP.

Ms. Calhoun stated, “I am honored to join the Aligos team sitting parallel to veteran experts with years of drug research and development experience, and I look forward to joining them in driving Aligos’ future financial, strategic and operational capabilities. With a diversified asset portfolio in chronic hepatitis B backed by elite management and scientific teams, the company is well positioned to advance toward the clinic.”

Ms. Calhoun received her Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from San Francisco State University and is a Certified Public Accountant (inactive).

About Aligos
Aligos Therapeutics, Inc. is a privately held biotechnology company that was founded in 2018 with the mission to become a world leader in the treatment of liver diseases. Aligos is focused on the development of targeted, antiviral therapies including chronic hepatitis B (CHB) and COVID-19 as well as leveraging expertise in liver diseases to create targeted therapeutics for NASH, which collectively affect hundreds of millions of people across the world. Aligos’ strategy is to harness the deep expertise and decades of drug development experience its workforce has in liver disease, particularly viral hepatitis, to rapidly advance its pipeline of best-in-class molecules.

Please visit www.aligos.com for more information.

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LifeSci Advisors
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