News Release

Senior executives bring proven industry experience to leadership roles in regulatory affairs and communications

BOSTON, Jan. 19, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Atea Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq: AVIR) (“Atea”), a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company, today announced that it has expanded its senior management team with the appointments of Jayanthi Wolf, Ph.D., Senior Vice President of Regulatory Affairs and Jonae Barnes, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations and Corporate Communications.

“We are very pleased to welcome Jayanthi and Jonae to Atea,” said Jean-Pierre Sommadossi, Ph.D., Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Atea Pharmaceuticals. “They bring with them extensive and highly valuable industry experience, which will expand Atea’s capability as we continue to advance our corporate initiatives and our product candidates, including moving forward with the Phase 3 program for AT-527 for COVID-19 and AT-752 as a potential therapeutic for Dengue fever.”

Dr. Wolf has had an extensive career in research and development at Merck over a 19-year period. During her tenure at Merck, she served in a series of roles ranging from scientific to safety assessment and regulatory, with increasing responsibility in global regulatory affairs and clinical safety. Dr. Wolf has broad experience in regulatory affairs, including clinical, nonclinical and manufacturing and has managed programs from preclinical development through regulatory approval. She served as the global regulatory team leader for several products, including ERVEBO^®, the first Ebola vaccine approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the European Medicines Agency and prequalified by the World Health Organization. Dr. Wolf earned a Ph.D. and master’s degree in molecular biology and immunology from Princeton University and a B.S. in biochemistry from Susquehanna University.

Ms. Barnes has more than 20 years of experience in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry. Her experience in strategic investor relations and corporate communications spans the full life cycle of drug development and commercialization. She began her career at Sepracor (now Sunovion Pharmaceuticals; acquired by Dainippon Sumitomo Pharma Co.), where she held a series of progressively responsible management and executive roles over a 14-year period and served most recently as Senior Vice President, Investor Relations, Corporate Communications and Internal Communications. Ms. Barnes has also served in senior leadership roles at several biotechnology companies including Idenix Pharmaceuticals, Agenus, and most recently at Poxel SA. Ms. Barnes earned a B.S. in political science from Suffolk University and master's degrees in financial economics and multinational commerce from Boston University.

About Atea Pharmaceuticals

Atea Pharmaceuticals is a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company focused on discovering, developing and commercializing therapies to address the unmet medical needs of patients with life-threatening viral diseases. Leveraging the Company’s deep understanding of antiviral drug development, nucleoside biology, and medicinal chemistry, Atea has built a proprietary nucleotide prodrug platform to develop novel product candidates to treat single stranded ribonucleic acid, or ssRNA, viruses, which are a prevalent cause of severe viral diseases. Currently, Atea is focused on the development of orally-available, potent, and selective nucleotide prodrugs for difficult-to-treat, life-threatening viral infections, including severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus that causes COVID-19, dengue virus, hepatitis C virus (HCV) and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). For more information, please visit www.ateapharma.com.

Contacts

Investors:
Jonae Barnes
SVP, Investor Relations and Corporate Communications
617-818-2985
Barnes.jonae@ateapharma.com 

Will O’Connor
Stern Investor Relations
212-362-1200
will.oconnor@sternir.com 

Media:
Carol Guaccero
301-606-4722
contactus@ateapharma.com