CAMBRIDGE, Mass.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Korro Bio, Inc., a leading RNA editing company focused on the discovery and development of novel genetic medicines, today announced the appointment of Venkat Krishnamurthy, Ph.D., as Senior Vice President, Head of Platform and Stephanie Engels as Senior Vice President, Head of People and Culture. Venkat and Stephanie are accomplished industry leaders who bring vast expertise and experience to support the continued growth of the Company.
“We are thrilled to welcome Venkat and Stephanie at an exciting time for the company, as we continue to chart the course towards the clinic and expand our novel RNA editing platform,” said Ram Aiyar, Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer and President of Korro Bio. “Venkat’s expertise in all aspects of RNA therapeutics development including delivery and chemistry, combined with Stephanie’s experience in building and scaling learning organizations, are important additions as we continue to build our editing toolkit and deliver on our vision to develop genetic medicines for diseases with high prevalence.”
About Venkat Krishnamurthy, Ph.D.
Dr. Krishnamurthy has over a decade of experience in a range of RNA modalities including siRNA, mRNA and therapeutic genome editing technologies where he successfully built and led cross functional teams to support various aspects of drug development. Dr. Krishnamurthy arrives at Korro after serving in an Executive Director role at Eli Lilly & Company, where he was responsible for strategic direction for Lilly’s genetic medicine portfolio. Prior to this, Dr. Krishnamurthy was a Team Lead at AstraZeneca, where he built a new modalities group at the Boston site to support the company’s mRNA and genome editing projects from discovery to clinic. He began his industry career at Dicerna Pharmaceuticals and was one of the early chemists to advance the company’s siRNA platform. He also made critical contributions to the advancement of Nedosiran, Dicerna’s first GalNAc-siRNA program currently in Phase 3. Ahead of his experience in industry, Dr. Krishnamurthy was a faculty member at Harvard Medical School, where he led a lab focused on non-viral delivery for cell therapy and tissue engineering. He has contributed to over 30 publications and patents, and some of his work laid the foundation for projects funded by the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Krishnamurthy earned his doctorate in organic chemistry from the University of Illinois, Chicago, and completed postdoctoral training at Princeton University. He also holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in chemistry from Loyola College and the Indian Institute of Technology, Chennai, respectively.
About Stephanie Engels
Ms. Engels has over 20 years of human resources leadership experience in the life science and healthcare sectors. Prior to joining Korro, Ms. Engels served as Vice President, Head of HR Business Partnerships and Corporate Functions at Moderna, which included driving the organizational design and scaling of corporate functions pre- and post-commercialization of groundbreaking vaccine technology, the talent strategy and co-development of the company’s international Enterprise Solutions Hub project and the onboarding and integration of multiple C-suite executives. Prior to Moderna, Ms. Engels was Vice President, Talent at Zimmer Biomet, where she led talent acquisition and development efforts. Previously she served as Vice President & Head of HR, Corporate Functions & Global Product Strategy at Shire, where she notably acted as the HR representative during the company’s acquisition and integration by Takeda. Prior to her position at Shire, Ms. Engels accumulated experience in a variety of HR leadership roles across global Fortune 100 life sciences corporations.
About Korro Bio, Inc.
Korro is an RNA editing company focused on discovery and development of a new class of precision genetic medicines. Korro’s proprietary and modular platform, OPERA™, combines data-driven design with off-the-shelf chemistry and delivery to achieve highly selective RNA editing. This unique technology enables the functional benefits of gene therapy with a transient, repeated-administration regimen that permits pharmacologic titration of therapeutic efficacy and safety, in a cost-effective drug product. As a result, Korro’s portfolio of innovative RNA therapies has the potential to propel genetic medicine beyond rare genetic diseases into larger patient populations with common diseases. Korro is located in Cambridge, Mass. For more information, visit korrobio.com.
