Talus Bio announces new VP of Business Development to accelerate pharma partnerships

Talus Bio announces new VP of Business Development to accelerate pharma partnerships and advance transcription factor therapeutics to the clinic

SEATTLE, WA – Talus Bioscience, a drug discovery company founded by an industry-leading team driving advancements in proteomics, biochemistry, and machine learning, today announced its new Vice President of Business Development, Chris Joyce, MBA. Joyce’s expertise at the intersection of bioengineering and executing major partnerships with large pharma innovators will accelerate the development of Talus Bio’s pipeline of transcription factor therapeutics.

“Chris is among the best champions for industry-changing technologies and accelerating their impact on patients. He has shown how to craft partnerships that ensure success for all parties and accelerate valuable drugs to the market,” said Alex Federation, PhD, co-founder and CEO of Talus Bio. “We’re welcoming Chris to the team at a critical inflection point in Talus Bio’s trajectory. We’re launching into 2025 with two strong new therapeutic programs addressing lung and prostate cancer as we refine our growing arsenal of proprietary compounds in the year ahead.”

Talus Bio is leveraging its recent financing to expand the company’s pipeline of therapeutic assets addressing previously undruggable transcription factor targets. The company is advancing two new programs targeting TBXT in non-small cell lung cancer and androgen receptor splicing (AR) regulator NONO in castration-resistant prostate cancer, with pre-clinical lead optimization studies ongoing for both. Talus Bio has also discovered more than thirty new selective transcription factor modulators with the company’s Multiplexed Assays for the Rational Modulation of Transcription Factors (MARMOT). 

Joyce will build Talus Bio’s business development strategy and identify partnership opportunities to propel its growing pipeline toward the clinic for cancer and other disease processes like diabetes, inflammatory diseases, and neurological conditions. He will also work as a part of the leadership team to prioritize Talus Bio’s expanding pipeline. 

“Talus Bio has developed a game-changing triple threat with MARMOT, from leading-edge AI and proteomics to platform-wide automation. Talus Bio delivers assets that stand out in the transcription factor therapy arena,” said new Vice President of Business Development Chris Joyce. “It is the technological trifecta and methodical approach we need to deliver new drugs to patients with transcription factor-implicated diseases, not just in cancer, but across a wide range of other chronic conditions. The impact will be transformative, and we’re just starting to scratch the surface.”

Joyce brings over 15 years of expertise in biotech and business development, with a proven track record in commercialization, strategic partnerships, and service collaborations. Prior to joining Talus Bio, Joyce served as Director of Business Development at Absci, where he led corporate partnership initiatives across both industry and academic sectors. He has also held key business development roles at Adaptive Biotechnologies and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, contributing to growth and innovation in the biotech space.

Joyce will be among the Talus Bio representatives at the 43rd annual JP Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco, held January 13–16, 2025. Follow Talus Bio on LinkedIn for the latest news and information and visit https://talus.bio for more details on the company’s expanded therapeutic programs and partnership opportunities.

About Talus Bioscience

Founded in 2020 by Alex Federation, PhD, and Lindsay Pino, PhD, Talus Bio is a drug discovery and development company focused on therapeutics that target previously undruggable transcription factors. The Seattle-based company’s proprietary therapeutics discovery platform, MARMOT, integrates AI, next-gen proteomics, synthetic chemistry, and computational biology to engineer and interrogate drugs, proteins, and genomics at unprecedented scale. Talus Bio employs a growing team of more than a dozen world-leading experts in proteomics, biochemistry, computational biology, and machine learning.

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