Leadership Team
Orasis is led by a collaborative team of expert industry executives, Optometrists and Ophthalmologists with a diverse set of experiences in ophthalmic and optometric drug development and research, finance, as well as business development.
Chief Executive Officer
Elad Kedar is a seasoned CEO with over 20 years of executive experience in the pharmaceutical industry, developing, scaling, and commercializing healthcare organizations. He has proven success in various executive leadership positions (such as CFO Lilly South-East Europe, Founder of Pharma Swiss in Israel, CEO of Orasis Pharmaceuticals since inception) across different geographies and diverse expertise in all stages of the pharmaceutical life cycle, from early-stage clinical development to commercialization.
Mr. Kedar holds an MBA from INSEAD and a B.A. in accounting and law from Tel Aviv University.
Paul Smith brings over two decades of experience as a leader in Ophthalmics with a proven track record of launching, accelerating growth and building a culture that attracts top talent. His leadership experience spans startups, big pharma and device across sales, marketing, operations and market development verticals. Mr. Smith brings extensive global ophthalmic experience leading teams, building brands and commercializing products.
Mr. Smith earned his B.A. from the University of Central Florida and an MBA from the University of Florida.
Senior Vice President
Head of Strategy and Marketing
Julie Speed brings over two decades of proven ophthalmic leadership across both pharmaceutical and medical device. Her expertise spans from commercial leadership positions at Alcon and Johnson & Johnson Vision-Surgical, progressing commercial strategy and brands, to start-up organizations at Eyevance and TearLab, building marketing strategy and teams from the ground up. Her broad marketing and launch experience with U.S. and global brands will help accelerate Orasis towards launch readiness.
Ms. Speed earned her B.S. in Biomedical Science from Texas A&M University and MBA from Texas Christian University.
YARON SHIMON, CPA
VP Finance
Yaron Shimon is an experienced financial leader within the biotech industry, locally and globally. Yaron has vast experience including, but not limited to, equity fundraising from first-in-class venture funds, investment relations, legal and financial due diligence, FP&A, Cash flow management, and international tax. Yaron is also a certified CPA with knowledge of both US-GAAP and IFRS.
Mr. Shimon earned his BA in Accounting from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, MA in Internal Audit and Public Policy from Bar Ilan University and his CFO training from the Israeli CFO forum.
Chief Medical Officer
Dr. Ron Neumann has more than 30 years of experience as an ophthalmologist and working in the pharmaceutical industry. He has held many leading roles in clinical development and marketing, such as serving as the head of ophthalmology at Teva Pharmaceutical Industries. Dr. Neumann currently works as an advisor in the field of ocular drug development. He is also the chairperson for ISOPT Clinical (The International Symposium on Ocular Pharmacology and Therapeutics).
Dr. Neumann holds an M.D. in ocular immunology from Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary. He completed his fellowship program in inflammatory eye diseases at Harvard University.
VP Pharmaceutical Development and Manufacturing
Sharon Amzel-Sasson is a development and operations executive with 15 years of experience leading drug development (CMC) and project management teams in the biomedical industry, both in large multinational corporations as well as in startup environments. Ms. Amzel-Sasson is an expert in the development and manufacturing of pharmaceutical drugs and drug-device combination products, with extensive expertise in ophthalmic and sterile products.
Ms. Amzel-Sasson holds an MBA from Tel Aviv University and a B.S. in biotechnology and food engineering from the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology.
Head of Regulatory Affairs
Ms. Meisner holds a Federal Diploma of Pharmacy from the University of Geneva, Switzerland.
TES IGNACIO, MD.
VP, Medical Affairs
Tes is a fellowship trained Ophthalmologist with almost two decades of clinical research and industry experience. She has held many global leadership roles for various mid-size and large surgical device and pharmaceutical companies such as IntraLase, Bausch & Lomb, Alcon and Allergan. In addition, she has significant expertise in developing and executing a Global Medical Affairs strategy to educate the market pre-launch and support the brand lifecycle post-launch.
Dr. Ignacio earned her MD and Ophthalmology residency in the Philippines where she had a private practice before moving to the US. She completed her fellowship in Cornea and Refractive Surgery at University of California Irvine.