Management Team

Litain Yeh, PhD
Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer
Prior to funding the company, Dr. Yeh served as Vice President, Drug Development at Ignyta, where he led the progression of Ignyta’s multiple programs from Discovery to clinical development, and eventually to approval of Rozlytrek (entrectinib). He led the clinical pharmacology through all clinical phases, and NDA preparation of entrectinib. In addition, Dr. Yeh assisted the business development group in the sale of entrectinib to Roche.
Previously, Dr. Yeh served as Vice President, Translational Sciences at Ardea Biosciences, a member of the AstraZeneca Group, where he led the progression of Ardea’s internal development programs from concept to clinical development, and eventually to approval. He led the development teams through all clinical phases, IND, and NDA preparation. In addition, Dr. Yeh assisted the business development group in the sale of Ardea Biosciences to AstraZeneca, and in the successful licensing of refametinib to Bayer Healthcare. He supervised Ardea’s clinical pharmacology activities during clinical trials of refametinib, lesinurad, and verinurad.
Earlier in his career, Dr. Yeh managed all internal teams to support all development activities, and CRO monitoring. Dr. Yeh held positions of increasing responsibility at Valeant Pharmaceuticals, Ribapharm, and ICN Pharmaceuticals.
Dr. Yeh received a Ph.D. in chemistry from Case Western University.

Robert Keenan, MD
Chief Medical Officer
Prior to joining Arthrosi, Dr. Keenan spent most of his career at Duke University. Dr. Keenan was the Founding Director of the Gout and Crystal Arthropathy Clinic at Duke University Medical Center. During that time, he also held numerous roles, including Associate Chief Medical officer of the Patient Revenue Management Organization, Vice Chief for Clinical Affairs for the Division of Rheumatology, Medical Director of the Duke Specialty Infusion Center, and Associate Professor of Medicine at Duke University School of Medicine in the Division of Rheumatology and Immunology.
Dr. Keenan has also published several peer-reviewed articles and book chapters on gout. He obtained his undergraduate and Master of Public Health degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, his Doctor of Medicine from St. George’s University School of Medicine, Master of Business Administration from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst and completed his Fellowship in Rheumatology at New York University.

Shunqi Yan, PhD
Co-Founder & Chief Operating Officer
Shunqi Yan, Ph.D. has over 20 years of drug discovery and development experience in oncology, metabolic, anti-inflammation and rare diseases. He led multidisciplinary teams in various biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies with expertise including drug design with cutting edge technology in computational science and artificial intelligence (AI), medicinal and pharmaceutical chemistry.
Dr. Yan is an inventor of over 400 worldwide patent filings, 230 issued patents globally, 25 granted patents in US and an author of over 30 peer reviewed journal articles. He contributed to the design and discovery of six clinical drugs including 3 FDA approved first-in-class drug, IDHIFA (enasidenib), TIBSOVO (ivosidenib) and PYRUKYND (mitapivat), for the treatment of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) in adults with IDH2, IDH1 mutations and pyruvate kinase deficiency (PKR) deficiency, respectively. Dr. Yan received his Ph.D. degree in Organic Chemistry from Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey and Post-Doctoral training in the National Cancer Institute, NIH.

Stephen Smolinski
Chief Business Officer
Before joining Arthrosi, Mr. Smolinski was SVP of Business Development at Precigen, a Cell and Gene Therapy company. Prior to that, he was at Sobi where he was the Head, Immunology Therapeutic Area. Prior to that, Mr. Smolinski served as the Chief Commercial Officer for Selecta Biosciences where he led the commercial efforts related to SEL-212 for Chronic Refractory Gout. He was involved in multiple gene therapy business development deals leading to collaborations and licensing deals with AskBio and Sarepta. Mr. Smolinski served as the Vice President and Head of Sanofi/Genzyme’s North American Rheumatology Business Unit, where he led the development of the company’s commercialization plans for the rheumatoid arthritis medicine KEVZARA®. Prior to this, he served as Group Vice President of Immunology & Inflammation, Global Strategic Unit at Sanofi. Mr. Smolinski also previously held senior commercial roles at Roche-Genentech, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Johnson & Johnson, and Savient Pharmaceuticals. He earned a B.S. in Health Care Administration from Oregon State University.
Scientific Advisory Board

James Mackay, PhD
Founder & CEO, Aristea Therapeutics

Nicola Dalbeth, MD
Rheumatologist & Professor, the University of Auckland School of Medicine

Yasushi Ito, MD, PhD
Staff Physician, Kobe Tokushukai Hospital

Fernando Pérez-Ruiz, MD, PhD
Associate Professor, Cruces University Hospital University of the Basque Country

Ikumi Tamai, PhD
Professor, Institute of Medical, Pharmaceutical and Health Sciences, Kanazawa University
Board of Directors

Cynthia Cai, PhD, MBA, M Eng
President, Tharton Consulting Venture Partner, Viva BioInnovator

Hanxiong Li
Chairman & General Manager, ApicHope Pharmaceutical

James Mackay, PhD
Founder & CEO, Aristea Therapeutics
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Xin Xie, PhD
Venture Partner, LH-Ventures

Shunqi Yan, PhD
Co-Founder & COO, Arthrosi Therapeutics

Litain Yeh, PhD
Co-Founder & CEO, Arthrosi Therapeutics

Yiwei Zong, PhD, CFA
Co-Founder & COO, Anji Pharma