http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/blog/biotech/2015/03/kelly-martin-elan-serenus-biotherapeutics-africa.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+vertical_33+%28Health+Insurance+Industry+News%29
A drug company headliner invests in S.F. biopharma startup with Africa focus
Mar 3, 2015, 12:02am PST
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Serenus founder and CEO Dr. Menghis Bairu worked at Elan with Kelly Martin.
Former Elan Corp. chief Kelly Martin is taking an interest in Africa.
Martin, a director with Ireland's Malin Corp. plc, will join the board
of San Francisco's Serenus Biotherapeutics Inc. as chairman. Malin is
taking a 41 percent stake in the Africa-focused specialty
biopharmaceutical company for $18 million.
Malin will have the right to invest up to $25 million more and raise
its stake in Serenus to up to 76 percent.
Kelly and Dr. Menghis Bairu, the founder, president and CEO of
Serenus, are no strangers. Bairu was Elan's chief medical officer when
Martin was CEO.
Serenus specializes in late-stage drug development, in-licensing and
commercializing drugs for African markets that have been approved in
the United States, Europe and Japan.
Bairu is a native of the East African country of Eritrea. He created
Serenus last year to translate drugs for a growing African middle
class that has a bulging list of first-world health problems.
"Over time, you see the evolution of African countries and you see
diseases shifting," Bairu told me last year. "I want to change that.
We have to change that."
The route for taking Food and Drug Administration-approved drugs to
Africa may look easy to an outsider, but it's not, Bairu said. Africa
has multiple regulatory systems and distribution problems, for
example, but the payoff could be great.
"You just have to customize it and work with the on-the-ground team,"
Bairu said.
Received on Wed Mar 04 2015 - 21:46:14 EST