Artax Biopharma Inc, a development-stage biotechnology company, has named Joseph Lobacki as its new chief executive officer, it was reported on Wednesday.

Lobacki has more than three decades of leadership experience in research, development, and commercial roles at executive levels across large and small biopharmaceutical companies. Lobacki joins Artax Biopharma Inc from Verastem Inc where he served as executive vice president and chief commercial officer. He was also the chief operating officer of Finch Therapeutics Group, and chief commercial officer and executive council member of Medivation. His earlier roles include senior vice president and chief commercial officer of Micromet Inc, and senior vice president and general manager at Genzyme Corporation. He has also served as a director of Celator Pharmaceuticals. Presently, he is on the boards of Sutro Biopharma and Artax Biopharma.

Artax Biopharma's executive chairman of the board, Alan Walts, PhD, said, 'We are thrilled to have such a strategic and experienced leader as Joseph Lobacki steering Artax from our new US headquarters at this seminal time," stated Artax Biopharma's Executive Chairman of the Board Alan Walts, PhD. "His deep experience will prove invaluable as Artax's first oral agent to treat autoimmune disease prepares to enter the clinic.'