We are a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing advanced therapies for retinal disease. Our strategy is to target critical pathways underlying eye disease with innovative small molecules to preserve, slow down, or restore vision loss.
Kiora (kee-OR-ə) is a take on the Māori phrase, Kia ora, which means “have life” or “be healthy.” Ora also means “eye” in Latin. In essence, we are striving as a company to improve health through better vision.
Brian was a co-founder and Director of Bayon Therapeutics, Inc., and Okogen, Inc. Prior to founding Okogen, Brian worked at Sound Pharmaceuticals, Allergan, and Shire, where he was responsible for business development and corporate strategy in ophthalmology, otology, and regenerative medicine.
Brian began his career at Cytori Therapeutics with elevating roles within the commercial and R&D departments. Brian received his BS in Bioengineering from Cornell University and his PhD in Biomedical Engineering from UCLA.
Eric has over 20 years of operating experience in biotechnology and medtech companies. Prior to joining Kiora, he served as the CEO of OccuRx Pty Ltd and as Co-founder & Director of Bayon Therapeutics, Inc., both focused on the development of next generation ophthalmic therapeutics. Dr. Daniels is also a Co-Founder and Director of Okogen, Inc., a specialty ophthalmic biotechnology company.
Eric previously served as part of the leadership teams at Puregraft LLC, Tensys Medical, and Cytori Therapeutics, Inc., holding senior medical, R&D, and commercial roles. Eric holds an MBA from the Anderson School of Management at UCLA, where he also received his MD from the UCLA School of Medicine. Eric received his BS in Molecular Biology from the University of California, Berkeley.
Melissa Tosca is the Chief Financial Officer for Kiora Pharmaceuticals. She has 24 years of public accounting and finance experience, including 17 years at biotechnology and life science companies.
Prior to joining Kiora, Melissa served as Executive Director of Finance and Corporate Treasurer for Neomorph, where she managed the company’s finance and accounting functions. Prior to Neomorph, Melissa served as Director of Finance and Accounting at Omniome, where she built the accounting and finance infrastructure and managed the company’s financial operations. She spent 9 years at Caris Life Sciences prior to Omniome, serving in various leadership roles including Director of Finance and Accounting, Director of Financial Planning and Analysis, and Senior Director of Sales Operations.
Melissa began her professional career in public accounting at Clifton Gunderson and later Ernst and Young as an Audit Manager. Melissa is a Certified Public Accountant and holds a BS in Accounting from the University of Arizona.
Stefan acts as Executive Vice President CMC and Operations at Kiora. Previously, he was the co-founder and COO of Panoptes Pharma. Prior to this position he was global Project Manager at Nabriva Therapeutics AG, responsible for development of XENLETATM from early preclinical to clinical phase 2 programs. Before that he had various roles in R&D at Biovertis AG, Austria and Wilex AG, Germany.
He has profound knowledge of drug development and is an inventor on numerous patents. Dr. Stefan Sperl received his PhD in Medicinal Chemistry from the Max Planck Institute in Martinsried, Germany.
David Hollander, MD, MBA, Director, has served as a director since December 2021. Dr. Hollander most recently also served as Chief Medical Officer and Global Therapeutics Commercial Lead at Revance Therapeutics, Inc, until its acquisition by Crown Laboratories in February 2025. Prior to Revance, Dr Hollander was the Chief Research and Development Officer of Aerie Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Dr. Hollander began his career in industry in 2006 at Allergan, Inc as a Medical Director of Ophthalmology where he also held a number of leadership roles including Vice President of Eye Care for U.S. Medical Affairs, Vice President and Head of Eye Care for Global Medical Affairs, as well as Therapeutic Area Head in Clinical Development for Anterior Segment and Consumer Eye Care.
During this time, Dr. Hollander continued to see patients and instruct residents and fellows in cataract surgery and corneal transplantation. Dr. Hollander previously also served as Chief Medical Officer of Ora, Inc, where he oversaw medical operations across pharmaceutical and device clinical development, preclinical studies, as well as research and development into new regulatory endpoints, most notably the development of novel mobility courses for evaluating treatments for inherited retinal diseases.
Dr. Hollander received his B.S. in chemistry with honors and distinction from Stanford University and earned his medical degree at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. Dr. Hollander also obtained an M.B.A. in Health Care Management from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Hollander completed his residency in ophthalmology at the University of California, San Francisco, and a Heed Fellowship in Cornea, External Disease and Refractive Surgery at the Jules Stein Eye Institute/University of California, Los Angeles.
Erin was appointed as an independent Director for Kiora Pharmaceuticals in early 2022. She brings extensive knowledge and experience of the eyecare industry, and a broad clinical understanding of major ophthalmic diseases. During her career, she participated in the commercialization of XIIDRA®, OXERVATE®, LUCENTIS®, BEOVU®, DUREZOL®, and ZIRGAN®, among others.
In 2010, she founded Parsons Medical Communications (PMC) where she served as President. This leading agency provided scientific and strategic consulting to small and large companies in the ophthalmic space prior to its acquisition by the Fingerpaint Group. Prior to PMC, she was a founding member of Sirion Therapeutics where she led the medical communications department. Erin is involved with various associations in the eyecare space including Ophthalmic World Leaders, Ophthalmic Innovation Summit and The Holland Foundation for Sight. Erin holds a BS in Biology from Wake Forest University.
Aron is currently the Vice President of Clinical and Regulatory Affairs at Veradermics. Previously, he served as the Senior Vice President and Partner in the Asset Development & Partnering group at Ora, Inc, where he was responsible for Ora’s strategic partnering and investment opportunities with prior roles responsible for establishing and leading clinical regulatory strategy and clinical operations, business development and international growth strategy. He earned his BS in biological chemistry from Bates College.
Carmine Stengone has more than 20 years of experience as an executive in the life science industry where he has founded, operated, financed, transacted and negotiated strategic alliances for the companies he has served. Carmine is currently President, Chief Executive Officer and a member of the board of directors for Contineum Therapeutics (NASDAQ:CTNM). In this role, he has completed three private rounds of financing totaling >$180 million and executed a >$1 billion collaboration with Janssen Pharmaceutica NV, one of the Janssen Pharmaceutical Companies of Johnson & Johnson. Previously, he served as Senior Vice President, Business Development for COI Pharmaceuticals (now Avalon BioVentures Accelerator), and was a member of its investment committee, where he helped co-found six biopharmaceutical companies. While with Avalon Ventures, Carmine served as President and Chief Executive Officer of Avelas Biosciences, Inc., Vice President of Corporate Development for Afraxis Holdings, Inc. and as co-founder and CEO of Afraxis, Inc., a spin-out company from Afraxis Holdings. Earlier in his career, he held positions of increasing responsibility with Phenomix Corporation, Anadys Pharmaceuticals, Inc., and Johnson & Johnson. Carmine received his MBA from the Johnson Graduate School of Management at Cornell University and his MS and BS degrees in chemistry from Duke University and Wake Forest University, respectively.
Brian was a co-founder and Director of Bayon Therapeutics, Inc., and Okogen, Inc. Prior to founding Okogen, Brian worked at Sound Pharmaceuticals, Allergan, and Shire, where he was responsible for business development and corporate strategy in ophthalmology, otology, and regenerative medicine.
Brian began his career at Cytori Therapeutics with elevating roles within the commercial and R&D departments. Brian received his BS in Bioengineering from Cornell University and his PhD in Biomedical Engineering from UCLA.
Praveen has served as a Director since June 2008. He is currently founder of Potens Pharmaceuticals. Until April 2023, Dr. Tyle was the President & CEO of Invectys, Inc, an immuno-oncology company spun out of the world-renowned Pasteur Institute, Paris. Prior to joining Invectys, Inc, he served in leadership roles at Lexicon Pharmaceuticals, Osmotica Pharmaceutical Corp, United States Pharmacopeia (USP)and Novartis. He also is an independent member of the board of Orient EuroPharma Co., Ltd. of Taiwan and Maxwell Biosciences, Austin, Texas. Dr. Tyle holds a PhD in pharmaceutics and pharmaceutical chemistry from the Ohio State University and a BS in Pharmacy (honors) from the Indian Institute of Technology, Banaras Hindu University in India.
Ms. Walters-Hoffert was a co-founder of Daré Bioscience, Inc. and following the company’s merger with Cerulean Pharma, Inc. in July of 2017, became Chief Financial Officer of the resulting public company (NASDAQ:DARE) until 2024.
For more than 25 years, Ms. Walters-Hoffert served as an investment banker focused on small-cap public companies in the life science and technology sectors. From 2003 to 2015, Ms. Walters-Hoffert worked at Roth Capital Partners as Managing Director in the Investment Banking Division. Ms. Walters-Hoffert has also held various positions in the corporate finance and investment banking divisions of Citicorp Securities and Oppenheimer & Co, Inc.
Ms. Walters-Hoffert currently serves as a director for Flux Power Holdings, Inc. and is a member of the Board of Directors of The Elementary Institute of Science. Additionally, she has served as a member of the Board of Directors of the San Diego Venture Group, as Past Chair of the UCSD Librarian’s Advisory Board, and as the Past Chair of the Board of Directors of Planned Parenthood of the Pacific Southwest. Ms. Walters-Hoffert graduated magna cum laude from Duke University with a BS in Management Sciences.
Dr. Goldberg has been an investigator in dozens of interventional retinal therapeutic clinical trials. His research has been published extensively including first-author publications in The New England Journal of Medicine, Ophthalmology, JAMA Ophthalmology, and American Journal of Ophthalmology (AJO). He serves as a reviewer for the AJO and Retina, and regularly serves as faculty at national and international meetings. Additionally, Dr. Goldberg co-founded and is currently on the board of directors of Emmecell, a clinical-stage ophthalmic-focused biotechnology company developing regenerative, cell-based therapies for eye diseases.
Dr. Goldberg graduated from both college and medical school at Yale University. He completed his residency in Miami at the Bascom Palmer Eye Institute, one of the nation’s premier eye hospital and residency-training programs. He completed a fellowship in Vitreoretinal Diseases and Surgery at Tufts University and Ophthalmic Consultants of Boston. Dr. Goldberg is board certified by the American Board of Ophthalmology and is an active member of the American Society of Retinal Specialists, the Retina Society, the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology, and the American Academy of Ophthalmology.
Allen C. Ho MD, FACS is Attending Surgeon and Director of Retina Research and Co-Director of the Retina Service of Wills Eye Hospital and Professor of Ophthalmology at Thomas Jefferson University. He maintains special interests in macular diseases, diabetic retinopathy, surgical retinal diseases and clinical trials investigating new treatments for vitreoretinal diseases including gene and cell therapies and new surgical drug delivery devices and techniques. His experience includes collaborative translational and clinical trial clinical research with expertise in study design, methodological testing, data analyses, surgical instrumentation and procedure development, execution and communication of these studies and their study results, and commercialization and patient access to care. He is past President of The Retina Society and a leader of Eyecelerator, the largest ophthalmic innovation meeting in the world.
He has deep experience in translational clinical research and been Study Chair, Steering Committee Member or Principal Investigator of over 70 clinical trials. Dr. Ho has served on the US FDA Ophthalmic Device Panel, AAO Innovation Task Force, AAO Ophthalmic Retina Technology Assessment Committee, AAO Retina Measures Group, AAO IRIS Registry Committee and is past Chair of the AAO Retina Subspecialty Days.
Dr. Ho has authored over 325 peer reviewed publications and several textbooks and is Editor-in-Chief of Current Opinion in Ophthalmology and Chief Medical Editor of Retina Today. He has received distinguished awards from the American Academy of Ophthalmology, multiple retina societies and the American Diabetes Association. He is a perennial awardee of national Castle Connolly awards and has been named to The Ophthalmologist Power 100 most influential eye specialists in the world on multiple occasions, most recently 2024.
Dr. Christine Kay, MD, is a clinical scientist focused on inherited retinal diseases and is a vitreoretinal surgeon. She is the Director of Electrophysiology, Retinal Genetics, and Clinical Trials at Vitreoretinal Associates in Gainesville, Florida, and an Affiliate Assistant Professor at the University of South Florida. Prior to this, she was an Assistant Professor and Director of the retinal genetics service at the University of Florida.
She graduated from Harvard University with a magna cum laude in neuroscience, attended medical school at the University of Florida and completed her vitreoretinal surgical fellowship at the University of Iowa. After her vitreoretinal surgical fellowship, she was awarded a five-year Career Development Award from the Foundation Fighting Blindness, which launched her career as a clinical-scientist and inherited retinal disease specialist, and funded research focusing on optimizing adeno-associated virus (AAV) genetic therapy for the treatment of achromatopsia. Dr. Kay is a member of the American Academy of Ophthalmology, the Macula Society and the Retina Society.
She has published over 38 research papers in peer-reviewed ophthalmic journals, authored textbook chapters and serves as an editor for multiple ophthalmology and retinal journals. Dr Kay has developed a large inherited retinal disease patient population in her clinic, with over 1,000 patients in her clinical database.
Dr. Pennesi is the Kenneth C. Swan Endowed Professor of Ophthalmology and Chief of the Paul H. Casey Ophthalmic Genetics Division of Molecular and Medical Genetics at the Oregon Health & Science University, School of Medicine. He received his BS from UPenn, MD & PhD from Baylor College of Medicine and trained at Scripps Mercy Hospital in San Diego.
Dr Pennesi is a passionate clinician scientist focused on bringing cures to patients with inherited retinal diseases. He has led multiple clinical trials across various platforms for various inherited retinal diseases over his career.
Both Research to Prevent Blindness and the Foundation Fighting Blindness have recognized Dr. Pennesi with career development awards to support his ambition to conduct transitional research that will bring treatments for diseases such as retinitis pigmentosa from the laboratory to the clinic. Additionally, he is the recipient of the 2011 ARVO/Alcon Early Clinician Scientist, the Alcon Young investigator Award in 2014, and the Casey Eye Institute Resident teach award.
Dr. Wykoff is Director of Research at Retina Consultants of Texas and Chairman of Research & Clinical Trials, Retina Consultants of America. He received his baccalaureate from MIT, PhD from Oxford, MD from Harvard, and completed retina training at Bascom Palmer Eye Institute.
He is passionate about translational research and clinical trial design and has published over 200 peer-reviewed manuscripts. He serves on multiple scientific and medical advisory boards, safety monitoring committees, and global steering committees for endeavors spanning the innovative process from early to late stage developments.
He is President of the Vit-Buckle Society, serves on the ASRS Board of Directors, and is also a founding member of the Ophthalmology Retina Editorial Board. He has been awarded multiple Achievement and Honor Awards along with the ASRS Young Investigator and the AAO Secretariat Awards.
