Matisse Pharmaceuticals appoints Marcel Jacobs as CEO

Matisse Pharmaceuticals B.V., a clinical stage company developing a medicinal product for the treatment of sepsis, is pleased to announce that it has appointed Marcel Jacobs as its new CEO as per the 1st of January 2024. The Board of Directors continues to be formed by Marcel Jacobs and Kees Groen.

“We are very happy that Marcel is willing to take on the lead of the company and that both Marcel and Kees will continue to act as the Board of Directors in this crucial phase of the company. They, together with the supervisory board and shareholders, share the common Matisse goal & vision to become the first company worldwide to effectively combat sepsis” according to Georges de Meris, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Matisse Pharmaceuticals.

Marcel Jacobs - Chief Executive Officer

 Marcel has joined the Matisse Board of Directors as CBO in February 2023, where he focused mainly on finance,     funding, partnering, business planning, organisation & HR. Marcel holds an MBA in International Management. He   started in Biotech in 1998 and thereafter worked in the field of business development, marketing, sales & investor   relations. He held various director positions in listed infectious disease biotechnology companies Rhein Biotech, Berna   Biotech & Crucell (taken over for USD 2.4 billion by J&J in 2011) and worked in The Netherlands, South Korea and   Switzerland. In 2011, Marcel joined the management board as global commercial director for VDL Bus & Coach as well   as board member of all of its 13 foreign affiliates. In this period, the company achieved market leadership in the   transition to zero emission public transportation in Europe.

 In his new role as CEO, Marcel will continue his focus on securing funding to reach the next milestones as well to   manage the strategic, organisational and financial aspects of Matisse together with a great team of experts.

Kees Groen – Chief Development Officer

Kees joined the Matisse Board of Directors as CEO in February 2023. Kees, pharmacist by training, has his background in regulatory authorities, big pharma and drug development consultancy. Kees was a member of the drug development management team at Tibotec (sold to J&J in 2002), an extremely successful company in the field of HIV. He founded three very successful consultancy companies two of which were sold. As a consultant Kees Groen has been involved on a management and operational level in the fields of preclinical and clinical development, regulatory affairs and licensing. Since 2005, he is also active as a private investor in the biotech arena.

Besides his general management activities within Matisse, Kees has been focusing mainly on the further development of the lead compound M6229. In his new role Kees will act as Chief Development Officer with the main focus on advancing M6229 through the next clinical phase and to prepare the necessary regulatory steps towards market introduction.

About M6229

Matisse claims to have identified an elegant solution for treating sepsis by using a non-anticoagulant fraction of heparin called M6229 to neutralize toxic circulatory histones. Matisse’s platform technology is based on the discovery that in many patients suffering from sepsis, proteins called histones are released by the innate immune system and apoptotic and necrotic cells into the blood stream, where they are toxic to other cells. Due to this self-enforcing cascade, people may die from organ failure within one or two days. Preclinical results have shown that by neutralizing the toxic histones with Matisse’s product M6229, the negative cascade is inhibited by neutralization of cationic histones by anionic M6229. Currently, there is no effective treatment against sepsis. According to the WHO, sepsis is the leading cause of death. From the 49 million patients globally suffering from sepsis every year, more than 20% die. According to a recent J. Crit .Care Med. study, sepsis is the most common cause of in-hospital deaths, costing over $62 billion annually in the USA alone.

About Matisse Pharmaceuticals

Matisse Pharmaceuticals BV was founded in 2014 in Geleen, the Netherlands. Matisse targets life-threatening inflammation by neutralizing cytotoxic components of the inflammatory system. Its main development program is the development of a medicine to fight sepsis and septic shock.