Akcea Announces Appointment of New Chief Operating Officer

Alex Howarth joins Akcea from Lycera, bringing more than 25 years of experience in the biopharmaceutical sector

BOSTON, Dec. 04, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Akcea Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ: AKCA), a majority-owned affiliate of Ionis Pharmaceuticals, Inc., announced today that Alex Howarth has joined the company as chief operating officer. In this role, Mr. Howarth will oversee a broad range of operational areas including corporate strategy, business development, management of stakeholder alliances, legal and compliance, as well as product supply chain.

“Alex joins our team during an exciting time at Akcea. His decades of experience in the biopharmaceutical sector will further strengthen our executive leadership team and position us to continue to build on our strong record of progress and success. Alex has a background in leading companies as they optimize organizational, commercial and business strategies. His experience aligns well with our goals as we continue to invest in our two commercial-stage products and our promising pipeline of novel drugs positioned to address major areas of unmet need in health in the years ahead,” said Damien McDevitt, Ph.D., Akcea’s interim chief executive officer.  

Mr. Howarth has more than 25 years of experience in healthcare and financial advisory roles at various companies. Prior to Akcea, Mr. Howarth served as president at Lycera Corp., a private biotechnology company developing small molecule medicines for autoimmune diseases and cancer. Before that, Mr. Howarth served as chief financial officer of moksha8, a specialty pharmaceutical company focused on commercializing products in the emerging markets.  Mr. Howarth was a founding member of moksha8 where he played a leading role in defining corporate strategy as well as establishing and leading key operational functions comprising corporate development, finance, legal and compliance, supply chain and information technology. Prior to joining moksha8, Mr. Howarth was chief business officer at Vitae Pharmaceuticals and previously spent over ten years at GSK in a variety of corporate development and finance roles, including leading GSK Venture Partnerships.  Prior to joining GSK, Mr. Howarth worked at KPMG in London where he qualified as a chartered accountant.  Mr. Howarth has an honors degree in biochemistry from the University of Bath, England.