Ambys Medicines Expands Leadership Team with Key Appointments in Human Resources and Finance Functions

April 20, 2022 |

3 min read

Ambys Medicines, a company pioneering cell-replacement therapies for patients with liver failure, today announced the expansion of its leadership team with the appointments of Samira Shaikhly as Chief Human Resources Officer and John McKeon as Vice President of Finance.

SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Ambys Medicines, a company pioneering cell-replacement therapies for patients with liver failure, today announced the expansion of its leadership team with the appointments of Samira Shaikhly as Chief Human Resources Officer and John McKeon as Vice President of Finance. These executive appointments strengthen Ambys’s leadership team as the company prepares for its next growth phase and advances its lead hepatocyte replacement cell therapy program, AMI-918, toward the clinic.

“We’re excited to welcome Samira and John to Ambys as we expand our leadership team and continue to grow the business,” said Ronald Park, M.D., Chief Executive Officer of Ambys Medicines. “Both Samira and John bring a wealth of experience to Ambys that will be critical to our success as we transition to a clinical-stage company. Samira’s global human resources experience will support the continued growth of our employee base and recruitment of top-tier talent. Our priority is our people, and she will continue to strengthen our inclusive, people-first culture. John’s broad finance, accounting and analytics experience will bring important insights to our finance team as we progress our pipeline programs and ramp up our manufacturing capabilities in preparation for an IND filing and Phase 1 trial initiation next year.”

Samira Shaikhly

Samira is a global human resources leader with over 20 years of human resources experience, and a track record of success enabling organizational effectiveness. Before joining Ambys, Samira spent 15 years at Gilead Sciences in positions of increasing responsibility supporting a wide range of functions, geographies, and senior leaders. Most recently, she served as Global Head of Human Resources, Corporate Functions, where she was a human resources leadership team member. In this role, Samira worked with company leadership on organizational design, change management, culture, and talent initiatives. She led a global team of HR business partners responsible for global corporate functions. Before Gilead, Samira held a number of senior-level human resources roles in the technology sector. She received her B.A. in communications at the University of San Francisco and is a certified New Ventures West Executive Coach.

John McKeon, CPA

John joins Ambys with more than 20 years of finance experience. He previously served as Senior Director of Financial Planning and Analysis at Allakos, where he oversaw all financial planning functions for the public biotech company. Before Allakos, John held financial planning and analytics positions at Jaguar Health, BioMarin Pharmaceuticals, and Avinger, Inc. Earlier in his career, he spent 11 years at Genentech in finance and sales operations roles. John received his B.S. in business administration at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a Certified Public Accountant (inactive) in California.

About Ambys Medicines

Ambys Medicines is focused on pioneering cell replacement therapies for patients with liver failure. Ambys’s proprietary platform enables the company to be the first and only company able to develop and manufacture functional human hepatocytes at scale. Our scientific approach has the potential to fundamentally transform the treatment paradigm for patients with acute or chronic liver failure caused by acquired or genetic disease. Our lead program, AMI-918, is a hepatocyte replacement cell therapy in development to restore lost hepatic function. Beyond AMI-918, we are building a pipeline of next-generation modified hepatocytes that will rapidly expand the range of treatable patient populations. Learn more at ambys.com and follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram.