CRU BIO is dedicated to developing innovative therapies to address kidney and related diseases.
The Unmet Need
Kidney diseases represent an extraordinary unmet medical need, affecting approximately 10% of the global population. In the US alone there are 40 million people affected by kidney disease; moreover 1 in 3 adults are at risk for some form of kidney disease. Importantly, kidney disease expenditures are overrepresented in healthcare budgets. It is estimated that Medicare spends approximately $90 billion dollars annually on patients with kidney disease, representing nearly 24% of the total Medicare budget.
Patient Impact Opportunity
Advances in our scientific understanding of the underlying mechanisms of a variety of kidney diseases, coupled with the increased recognition by relevant stakeholders about the importance of innovation in kidney disease treatments, provide the framework for new and bold efforts to improve kidney health broadly.
Our Focus
We are dedicated to assembling a pipeline of promising drug candidates to evolve the treatment of kidney and related diseases
Founded by an experienced team with a track record of building pioneering companies and developing innovative new therapies
Robert M. Brenner, M.D. is a respected nephrologist with over two decades as a successful biotechnology executive. Dr. Brenner started his career at Amgen, where he led kidney related global development programs and supported two product approvals. Thereafter, Dr. Brenner was a member of the executive team at Amag Pharmaceuticals, contributing to their first therapeutic approval and launch.
Dr. Brenner then served as CEO at AlloCure, a privately held, clinical stage regenerative medicine company in the kidney space. Since then, Dr. Brenner has served as CMO at Orionis Biosciences and EVP of Research and Development at Codiak.
In recent years, Dr. Brenner has worked in healthcare venture capital and participated in the incubation and launch of new kidney companies in both the US and China.
Dr. Brenner received his B.A. from Johns Hopkins University and his M.D. from Albert Einstein College of Medicine. He completed his medical residency at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and his nephrology fellowship at Stanford University Medical Center.
Kevin Heyeck is a serial entrepreneur and seasoned biopharmaceutical executive with over 25 years experience building venture backed life sciences companies, with an extensive worldwide deal sheet.
Prior to Cru he was in venture capital investing in early stage life science companies, most recently as Senior Managing Director of 120 Capital. Previously he headed corporate and business development for multiple innovative life science companies including Allocure, Vitae Pharmaceuticals and Pharmacopeia.
Kevin began his career at Harvard University’s Office of Technology Licensing. His past Board memberships include Hibercell and Ultivue; Board observer of Iteos; and is a current Director of UAMS Bioventures.
Viken Paragamian is a seasoned biotechnology executive with over 30 years of leadership experience in the clinical development and regulatory management of innovative new therapies. Viken started his career at Sandoz Canada working on the development of Sandimmune (cyclosporine A) for the management of rejection in solid organ transplantation.
He then joined Amgen Canada, where he ultimately served as Chief Scientific Officer and Vice President of Scientific Affairs. Viken later served as Vice President of Clinical Development at AlloCure. Viken has also enjoyed success as a consultant to an array of biotechnology companies and start-up ventures. He was instrumental in the first regulatory approval for a gene therapy product in the world (Glybera), and helped several start-up companies navigate the IND process and conduct FIH studies.
Viken has deep operating experience in nephrology, oncology, regenerative medicine, gene therapy and rare disease clinical development and regulatory affairs.
Advised by respected leaders in kidney medicine
Glenn M. Chertow, MD, MPH is the Norman S. Coplon Satellite Healthcare Professor of Medicine and (by courtesy) of Epidemiology and Population Health, and Associate Chair (Fellowship Programs), Department of Medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine. Dr. Chertow completed his undergraduate education at University of Pennsylvania (1985) and his MD (1989) and MPH (1995) degrees at Harvard.
He completed residency in internal medicine and fellowship in nephrology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital before joining the Harvard faculty, where he remained until 1998. He then joined the faculty at University of California San Francisco, where he served as Director of Clinical Services in the Division of Nephrology and was promoted through the academic ranks to full Professor in the Departments of Medicine and Epidemiology and Biostatistics until joining the Stanford faculty as Professor and Division Chief in 2007, a position he held until 2021.
In addition to an active clinical practice, administrative responsibilities, teaching and mentoring, Dr. Chertow has developed and maintained a robust clinical research program. He has served or is currently serving in leadership roles for multiple NIDDK-, NHLBI-, and VA-sponsored clinical trials, including HEMO, DAC, ATN, FHN, SPRINT, PRESERVE, ISCHEMIA CKD, CURE-GN and TiME, and for several industry-sponsored clinical trials including TREAT, EVOLVE, BEACON, SYMPLICITY, REPRISE, CREDENCE, INNO2VATE, PRO2TECT, FIDELIO, FIGARO, and DAPA-CKD.
He has served in an advisory capacity to the Medicare Payment Advisory Committee and the National Quality Forum on issues related to the ESRD program, on NIH study sections, and in multiple roles with the American Society of Nephrology, including the Public Policy Board, Quality Metrics Taskforce, and as Associate Editor of the society’s leading journal. He is Co-Editor of Brenner and Rector’s The Kidney.
Dr. Chertow was honored by the American Kidney Fund with the National Torchbearer Award (2007) and the Nephrologist of the Year Award (2011) in recognition of his contributions to the care of persons with kidney disease. Dr. Chertow received the Belding H. Scribner Award from the American Society of Nephrology for outstanding contributions that have substantially changed the practice of nephrology (2015) and the David M. Hume Memorial Award (2018), the highest honor given by the National Kidney Foundation to a distinguished scientist-clinician in the field of kidney and urologic diseases.
Dr. Chertow is an elected member of the American Society of Clinical Investigation (2004), Association of American Physicians (2015), and National Academy of Medicine (formerly Institute of Medicine) (2015).
Richard J. Glassock, M.D. graduated from the UCLA School of Medicine in 1960 and received post-graduate training at UCLA, Harvard, and Scripps Research Institute. His main interests are in glomerular disease, CKD, and clinical nephrology. He has published over 750 original papers, books, book chapters, and reviews.
He is the Past President of the American Society of Nephrology (ASN) and the National Kidney Foundation (NKF) and Past Chairman of the American Board of Internal Medicine. He is the former Chair of the Departments of Medicine at the University of Kentucky (1992-1999) and Harbor-UCLA Medical Center (1980-1992). He is a Master of the American College of Physicians and a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians (UK). He was the founding Editor-in-Chief of the ASN NephSAP and Journal of the American Society of Nephrology (2002) and is an Editor of the nephrology section of UpToDate, an Associate Editor of the American Journal of Nephrology, and a founding Moderator of the ASN Communities online site.
He has received the NKF David Hume Memorial Award, the ASN Robert Narins Award, Distinguished Achievement Awards from UCLA and the Association of Professors of Medicine, the Torchbearer Award of the American Kidney Fund, and the Medal of Excellence Award from the American Association of Kidney Patients. He is currently Professor Emeritus at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and an independent medical consultant.
Vladlen ("Vlad") Slepak received his Ph.D. in bioorganic chemistry from Moscow State University/Shemyakin Institute in Moscow in 1988. He then moved to the US for postdoctoral training as a research fellow at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in Pasadena, California. During his training, he applied biochemical and cell biology approaches to characterize several G protein subunits that were cloned in the lab. In 1995, Vlad joined the faculty at the University of Miami School of Medicine, where he is now a Professor of Molecular and Cellular Pharmacology. His lab conducts mechanistic studies of proteins involved in G protein-coupled receptor pathways in the visual system, endocrine pancreas, and recently focused on ectopically expressed olfactory receptors. His group developed an effective system for high-throughput screening of molecular probes for ORs and discovered a family of synthetic agonists and antagonists for one of these understudied GPCRs. Vlad has been a Principal Investigator (PI) on grants funded by NIH NIDDK, NEI, NIGMS, AHA, PhRMA, and other foundations. He is an Editorial Board Member for the Journal of Biological Chemistry and a Member of the Molecular Pharmacology Executive Committee of the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics (ASPET).
David Warnock, M.D. graduated from the University of California at Berkeley and received his MD degree from the University of California, San Francisco. His clinical training was completed at the University of California, San Francisco, including a 1 year research fellowship with Isidore Edelman, MD in the Cardiovascular Research Institute.
Following a fellowship with Maurice Burg, MD at the NIH, Dr. Warnock returned to UCSF as a faculty member. He served as the Section Chief at the San Francisco VA Medical Center during the last 5 years of his appointment at UCSF. Following a sabbatical with Bernard Rossier, MD at the Institute of Pharmacology in Lausanne, Switzerland, Dr. Warnock was recruited to University Alabama, Birmingham as the Director of the Division of Nephrology in 1988, a role he served in until 2015. And in 2005, Dr. Warnock also began serving as the Director of the Office of Human Research at UAB.
Since 2015, Dr. Warnock has served as Professor of Medicine (Emeritus) at the UAB School of Medicine. Dr. Warnock’s research interests include acid-base physiology, sodium transport mechanisms, chronic kidney disease, and inherited renal diseases.
He is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation, American Association of Physicians, American Physiologic Society, ASN, NFK and ISN. He is a past President of the National Kidney Foundation.
