CEO, President, and Co-Founder Michael J. Reilly Mr. Reilly has 22 years of international leadership experience in marketing, business development, strategy, and finance at Amgen, Baxter, Sanofi, Sterling Drug, and Eastman Kodak. Prior to his appointment as CEO/President at Western States, he was the Senior Director, Strategy & Portfolio Management and member of the Senior Management Team at Baxter BioScience.
Mr. Reilly was the commercial lead for Amgen’s acquisition of Immunex and its drug Enbrel, the largest in biotech history at $16B. While based in Paris with Sanofi, he was on the core executive team of the $1.7B acquisition of Sterling Drug.
Mr. Reilly has directed and participated on various teams for the launch and marketing for commercially available inflammation and autoimmune disease therapeutics including Enbrel (etanercept), Plaquenil (hydroxychloroquine), and Hyalgan (sodium hyaluronate). He was Head of National Account Marketing for the $2B blockbuster Epogen (epoetin alfa).
As Global Commercial Leader at Amgen, Michael led over ten inflammation products in development with a variety of mechanisms, modalities, and therapeutic targets. He was co-leader of Denosumab, currently pharma’s most valuable R&D product valued at $6.8B.
Michael earned a BA in Molecular Biology from University of California Berkeley, and a MBA from the University of Michigan.
Chief Scientific Officer and Co-Founder Dr. Carl K. Edwards, III, PhD. Dr. Edwards has 20 years of leadership in inflammation drug discovery and development at Amgen, Inc., Marion Merrell Dow, Inc., (now Aventis-Sanofi), Schering AG, and the University of Colorado Denver, Anschutz Medical Campus (Aurora, CO). Since 1995, he has been a faculty member as an Associate Professor, in the Department of Dermatology at University of Colorado Denver, Anschutz Medical Campus, which is located at the new Fitzsimons Campus in Aurora, CO. Dr. Edwards also holds faculty appointments in the Division of Infectious Diseases and Rheumatology at UCD.
Dr. Edwards was named as inventor of a novel second generation soluble TNFα receptor molecule, PEG sTNF-R1 (Pegsunercept™), and he led the Clinical Research Project Team at Amgen from discovery (1995-1997), through preclinical (1998), to the end of Phase II clinical development (1999 – 2002).
Dr. Edwards was also a core member of the Interleukin-1 receptor antagonist (IL-1ra; Kineret®) Biological License Application team and headed up the Preclinical Pharmacology Team. This agent was approved by the FDA for Rheumatoid Arthritis in November 2001.
At MMD, he discovered a new class of orally active anti-TNFα molecules known as Carbocyclic Adenosine nucleosides, and one lead molecule, MDL201449A, was advanced to the IND stage in 1994.
Carl holds a BS in Microbiology from Colorado State University (1980), an MA in Immunology from The University of Colorado at Boulder (1984), and a PhD in Immunophysiology from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign (1989). Dr. Edwards performed Post-Doctoral research at the University of Indiana Medical School, Indianapolis, IN (1990). Dr. Edwards has been named as an inventor on 45 United States and International Patents, and he has authored 120 peer reviewed manuscripts and book chapters. Dr. Edwards is a native of Colorado and currently makes his residence in Denver, CO.
CEO, President, and Co-Founder
Chief Scientific Officer and Co-Founder