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Dr. Stuart Hughes, CEO, and Vanessa Malier, Chair of the Board of Directors at Nuage Therapeutics
 01.04.2025

Nuage Therapeutics appoints Dr. Stuart Hughes as CEO and Vanessa Malier as Chair of Board of Directors

Nuage Therapeutics, a biotech company, based in the Barcelona Science Park, focused on creating transformational precision therapies by targeting established oncogenic transcription factors, has announced the appointment of Dr. Stuart Hughes as the new CEO, who succeeds founder Judit Anido, until now CEO, and who is accompanying this leadership transition. In addition, the startup is adding Vanessa Malier as chair of the board of directors. Nuage Therapeutics is currently working on the application of its proprietary technology for the development of a pipeline of novel agents targeting oncogenic transcription factors.

The biotechnology company has developed a set of tools that enables the reconstitution of intrinsically-disordered proteins (IDPs) in a secondary-structured form that renders them amenable to small molecule drug discovery. This has enabled the Company to unlock a wide range of previously intractable but important drug targets with a robust human biological basis for therapeutic intervention.

Dr. Stuart Hughes has broad R&D leadership experience in a range of settings, having worked in drug discovery across multiple therapeutic areas. He joins Nuage from Pathios Therapeutics, an immuno-oncology company where he served as CEO and where he built the company from an initial seed investment to a clinical-stage organisation. During this period, he led the completion of a €25m Series B first close, that included the addition of Bristol Myers Squibb as a strategic investor, to support ongoing Phase 1 studies. Previously, he was a Senior Director at the global biotech, Vertex Pharmaceuticals and before then, he was a Principal Research Scientist in CNS disorders at Eli Lilly.

“Nuage possesses a highly differentiated suite of technologies that enables the capture of ‘disordered’ proteins in a form that is amenable to small molecule screening and profiling. I believe Nuage represents a game-changing advance in drug discovery and precision medicine, especially where targets have previously been considered undruggable. Allied to a highly skilled team and the support of top-tier investors, Nuage is ideally positioned for growth and success. I look forward to getting started”, has stated Dr. Hughes.

On her side, Vanessa Malier is a board member and advisor to biotechs, venture capital and private equity firms. She previously spent 10 years as Managing Partner at Kurma Partners and was instrumental in the scale-up of the firm, fundraising Biofund III and the growth fund, completing the deal with Eurazeo and investing in portfolio companies. Prior to Kurma, Vanessa spent 10 years at Ipsen, in a variety of strategic and operational roles including Chief of Staff to the CEO, Adenuric® Lead, VP R&D Strategic Planning and BD. Vanessa is a non-executive director of Sygnature Discovery. She graduated from Pasteur Institute in Immunology and Ecole Normale Supérieure in Biology and Biochemistry.

“Vanessa has already been helping to shape Nuage over the last year, and now that Stuart has joined, together they can combine their broad and complementary scope of leadership, biotech and VC experience to moving the Company forward. Their appointments are happening at an exciting time for the Company as it looks to usher in a new wave of transformational precision therapies for a range of cancers that currently have limited treatment options”, has explained Maina Bhaman, Partner at Sofinnova Partners.

Clara Campàs, Managing Partner and co-founder of Asabys Partners, thanked the outgoing CEO, Dr. Anido, “for her stewardship to date and her assistance in a smooth transition to Stuart and the team” and said that they “have been long term supporters of the company and its technology since its inception and believe strongly in its truly differentiated approach”. “Nuage is located within the thriving, rapidly growing biotech and pharma ecosystem in Barcelona, and we believe it has all the ingredients to deliver on its promise”.

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