Jackie Fouse leaves Dermavant for Agios Pharmaceuticals

Jackie
Fouse
Courtesy
Agios

• Pharma veteran Jackie Fouse is leaving her role as
  executive chairman at Dermavant, a company founded by
  
  Vivek Ramaswamy, to join cancer drugmaker Agios
  Pharmaceuticals as CEO.
• Before Dermavant, Fouse was president of biotech giant
  Celgene. 
• It’s the second major executive departure for Roivant
  Sciences’ portfolio of companies. 
• Current Agios CEO David Schenkein will move into the
  executive chairman role in February 2019.

Another top executive is leaving a biotech that’s part of Roivant
Sciences, the company founded by 33-year-old former
hedge fund manager Vivek Ramswamy. 

Pharma veteran Jackie Fouse, currently the executive chairman of
Roviant subsidiary Dermavant, will become CEO of cancer drug
company Agios Pharmaceuticals in February 2019, the drugmaker
said on Tuesday. 

Fouse, who worked with Agios during her time at Celgene and as a
board member, came into the role after other board members asked
if she’d be willing to be considered as a potential candidate to
replace current Agios CEO David Schenkein.  

After serving as Celgene’s president, Fouse joined Dermavant, a
dermatology company that’s part of the Roivant Sciences
umbrella, in July 2017. The goal of Roivant is to spot
and develop drugs that other pharmaceutical companies have
ditched.

Roivant raised $1.1 billion in 2017 in a round led by

SoftBank’s Vision Fund, and has so far launched 12
subsidiary companies. Those include neurodegenerative disease
drug developer Axovant, women’s
health company Myovant, 
and urology company Urovant. 

Fouse is now the second major executive to leave a Roivant
company. In February, former Medivation CEO David Hung left his
post as chief executive of Axovant. Hung
had been at Axovant for only 10 months, during which time its
lead Alzheimer’s drug failed a key clinical trial. Axovant has
since
discontinued that drug program and pivoted to developing
a gene
therapy for Parkinson’s disease. 

In June,
Roivant also went through a restructuring that included a 10%
cut to its staff. 

Agios Pharmaceuticals is a cancer drugmaker that has
two approved treatments for acute myeloid leukemia. The
two drugs work to starve out cancer cells, targeting something
known as cancer cell metabolism.

Schenkein will move to an executive chairman position following
Fouse’s appointment.

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