Catherine Isted, an experienced healthcare CFO with over 25 years in life sciences, appointed as CFO effective February 24, 2025
Current CFO Andrew Smith to step down after five years with Santhera, and will support an orderly transition
Pratteln, Switzerland, February 10, 2025 – Santhera Pharmaceuticals (SIX: SANN) announces the appointment of Catherine Isted as Chief Financial Officer (CFO), effective February 24, 2025. She succeeds Andrew Smith, who, after five years at Santhera and financially securing the stable foundations of the company, has decided to step down. He will remain available to support the transition over the coming months.
Proven financial leadership to support next growth phase Catherine Isted brings over 25 years of leadership experience in life sciences finance, corporate development, and investment banking, making her ideally suited to support Santhera’s continued commercial expansion and next phase of growth.
Most recently, she served as CFO at BenevolentAI (Euronext Amsterdam: BAI), an AI-driven drug discovery company, where she oversaw financial operations, investor relations, and corporate strategy. Prior to that, she was CEO and CFO of ReNeuron Group plc (AIM: RENE), a UK-based biotech company focused on stem cell-derived exosome technologies. Catherine also held the role of Head of Corporate Development and Investor Relations at Oxford Biomedica plc (LSE: OXB), a leading gene and cell therapy company, during a period of significant growth, working on corporate strategy, strategic transactions and internationalizing the shareholder base.
Earlier in her career, Catherine spent over 15 years in healthcare investment banking, holding senior roles at Morgan Stanley, ABN AMRO, Nomura, and Peel Hunt, where she advised life sciences companies on IPOs, financings, and investor strategy, working with leading healthcare investors from across the US, EU and UK. She began her career as a bench scientist at Merck Sharp & Dohme (MSD) before transitioning into finance. Catherine holds a Bachelor’s degree in Chemistry from the University of Leicester and is a Chartered Management Accountant (ACMA).
Her extensive experience in public markets, corporate development, and financial strategy, combined with her deep understanding of the biopharmaceutical sector, will be invaluable as Santhera advances its commercial strategy.
Smooth transition with strong financial position Andrew Smith joined Santhera as CFO in early 2020, playing a pivotal role in exercising the global rights for vamorolone, helping navigate the company through its transformation into a commercial-stage business, and securing the financial foundation to support its long-term strategy. Under his leadership, the Company successfully completed licensing agreements, debt restructuring, and multiple funding rounds, securing capital to support operations until projected cash breakeven in mid-2026. In addition, Andrew has played a key role in the development and implementation of legal frameworks and operational processes to build and support the commercial infrastructure. Andrew will support a smooth and orderly transition over the coming months.
Dario Eklund, CEO of Santhera Pharmaceuticals, commented: "Andrew has been an exceptional financial leader, helping to secure our financial future and enabling the Company’s strong commercial trajectory. After five successful years with Santhera we greatly appreciate his commitment to ensuring a seamless transition."
We are equally thrilled to welcome Catherine Isted as our new CFO. Her strong finance and corporate development experience within the sector, supports our efforts in evaluating additional late-stage pipeline assets in rare & orphan diseases through distribution agreements or licensing partnerships."
Catherine Isted, newly appointed CFO, stated: "I am delighted to be joining Santhera at such an exciting time in the Company’s evolution as we establish ourselves as a global leader in DMD, making a real difference to patients worldwide. I look forward to working alongside Dario and the leadership team to build on this momentum, drive commercial success, and deliver value to both patients and shareholders."
Andrew Smith, outgoing CFO, added: "The past five years at Santhera have been both challenging and incredibly rewarding, as we have progressed towards the successful commercial launch of vamorolone. With the company in a secure financial position and with a clear path to break even, now is the right moment to pass on the baton. I look forward to supporting Catherine during the transition and following Santhera’s progress in the years ahead."
About Santhera Santhera Pharmaceuticals (SIX: SANN) is a Swiss specialty pharmaceutical company focused on the development and commercialization of innovative medicines for rare neuromuscular diseases with high unmet medical need. The Company has an exclusive license from ReveraGen for all indications worldwide to AGAMREE® (vamorolone), a dissociative steroid with novel mode of action, which was investigated in a pivotal study in patients with Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) as an alternative to standard corticosteroids. AGAMREE for the treatment of DMD is approved in the U.S. by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), in the EU by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), in the UK by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), in China by the National Medical Products Administration (NMPA) and Hong Kong by the Department of Health (DoH). Santhera has out-licensed rights to AGAMREE for North America to Catalyst Pharmaceuticals and for China and certain countries in Southeast Asia to Sperogenix Therapeutics. For further information, please visit www.santhera.com.
AGAMREE® is a trademark of Santhera Pharmaceuticals.
Disclaimer / Forward-looking statements This communication does not constitute an offer or invitation to subscribe for or purchase any securities of Santhera Pharmaceuticals Holding AG. This publication may contain certain forward-looking statements concerning the Company and its business. Such statements involve certain risks, uncertainties and other factors which could cause the actual results, financial condition, performance or achievements of the Company to be materially different from those expressed or implied by such statements. Readers should therefore not place undue reliance on these statements, particularly not in connection with any contract or investment decision. The Company disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements.
