Crystalys Therapeutics is strengthening both its board and executive team at a pivotal stage in its growth, bringing former Horizon Therapeutics CEO Tim Walbert into the Chair role while adding experienced pharmaceutical and operational leadership as dotinurad progresses through global Phase 3 development.
The leadership required to start a biotechnology company is not always the same leadership needed to take a potential medicine through late-stage trials and towards the commercial market.
Crystalys Therapeutics is preparing for that transition.
The San Diego-based clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company has announced a series of leadership changes as dotinurad, its potential treatment for gout, progresses through its global registrational programme.
At the centre of the changes is Tim Walbert, the former Chairman, President and CEO of Horizon Therapeutics, who has been named Chairman of the Crystalys Board after serving as an independent director since January 2026.
Walbert brings experience particularly relevant to the stage Crystalys is entering.
He led Horizon Therapeutics between 2008 and 2023, helping develop the business into a major rare-disease biopharmaceutical company before its approximately $28 billion acquisition by Amgen. Earlier in his career, he held senior positions at Abbott, now AbbVie, where his responsibilities included helping lead the global development and launch of HUMIRA across multiple indications.
Adding Commercial and Governance Experience
Walbert’s appointment is only one part of the leadership expansion.
Seth H.Z. Fischer, former CEO of Vivus and a pharmaceutical executive with nearly three decades of senior leadership experience at Johnson & Johnson, has joined Crystalys’ Board representing Catalys Pacific.
His background spans pharmaceutical operations, commercial strategy, corporate governance and medical devices, including previous leadership positions as Company Group Chairman for North America Pharmaceuticals at Johnson & Johnson.
Internally, DeAnne Reid has been promoted to Chief Administrative Officer.
Reid is a Crystalys co-founder and previously served as Executive Director of Operations and Business Development. She brings 12 years of biotech and biopharmaceutical experience and will now help oversee operations and organisational growth as the company scales.
Co-founder BT Slingsby, who has served as Executive Chairman since Crystalys was founded, will transition to a Board Observer role on behalf of Catalys Pacific.
Leadership for the Next Stage
The appointments arrive at an important point in Crystalys’ development.
The company is advancing dotinurad through the Phase 3 RUBY and TOPAZ trials, evaluating the therapy as a potential option for patients with gout who do not achieve or maintain target serum uric acid levels following first-line therapy or cannot tolerate it. Dotinurad has already been approved in Japan and four other Asian markets.
Crystalys is also conducting the Phase 2 AMETHYST study for patients with difficult-to-treat gout.
The company strengthened its financial position earlier this year as well, announcing a $130 million Series B financing in July to support Phase 3 development and potential commercialisation.
Taken together, the financing and leadership appointments show a company preparing its organisation alongside its clinical programme.
For biotech leaders, that is an important distinction. Scientific progress may create the opportunity, but moving a medicine through late-stage development, regulatory processes and eventually towards patients requires a broader organisation capable of supporting it.
Crystalys is now assembling that leadership infrastructure; bringing together clinical ambition, commercial experience, governance and operational scale as dotinurad enters a consequential stage of its development.
Sources: Crystalys Therapeutics; PR Newswire; Catalys Pacific.
