7 February 2020 - - US-based computation and biotechnology company Relay Therapeutics has appointed James Nichols, Ph.D. as head of genetic diseases, the company said.

Nichols brings to Relay Therapeutics more than 20 years of experience as a biotech entrepreneur and operating executive.

Prior to Relay Therapeutics, Dr. Nichols spent five years as the chief operating officer at Warp Drive Bio. There, he led corporate, platform and product strategic planning, business development, intellectual property and program and portfolio management.

During his tenure at Warp Drive, Nichols played an instrumental role in restructuring Warp Drive's corporate, partnering and platform strategy and was a co-inventor on multiple foundational platform patents.

Previously, Nichols served as president, chief operating officer and board member at Resolvyx Pharmaceuticals.

Prior to Resolvyx Pharmaceuticals, Nichols was vice president of therapeutics at CombinatoRx and a consultant at Braun Consulting.

Nichols holds a Ph.D. in neuroscience at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and was a Helen Hay Whitney postdoctoral fellow in neuroscience at Stanford University Medical School. He holds a B.A. in philosophy from Columbia University.

Relay Therapeutics is a new breed of company at the intersection of leading edge experimental and computational approaches focused on making medicines against intractable precision medicine targets. Relay Therapeutics harnesses the forces of expanding computational power and increasing experimental insights to better understand the dynamic nature of protein motion.

The approach has been validated with multiple programs poised to enter the clinic. While the company's initial focus has been in oncology, Relay Therapeutics' approach has broad applicability and potential to design transformative medicines across a range of disease areas.

Headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Relay Therapeutics is a private company launched in 2016.

To date, the company has raised USD 520m from investors including SoftBank Vision Fund, Third Rock Ventures, Casdin Capital, GV, BVF Partners, EcoR1 Capital, Foresite Capital, Perceptive Advisors, Tavistock Group and an affiliate of D.E. Shaw Research.