Ovid Therapeutics Inc. is expanding its medical and development team with the respective appointments of industry veterans, Manoj Malhotra, M.D., as its Chief Medical Officer and Toshiya Nishi, D.V.M., as its Head of Epilepsy Research. Dr. Malhotra is a neurologist with a specialty in epilepsy. He completed his residency in neurology and his fellowship in neurophysiology at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation and served as the Chief of Neurology at Kaiser Permanente. Immediately prior to joining Ovid, Dr. Malhotra served in the Neurology Business Group at Eisai Pharmaceuticals. During his tenure, he led Global Medical Affairs for their epilepsy and multiple sclerosis businesses. Dr. Malhotra was also a Global Senior Medical Director at Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals Autoimmune and Rare Disease Unit, and he held senior roles at Takeda Pharmaceutical supporting its Alzheimer's disease program, and within Novartis Medical Affairs. Throughout his career, Dr. Malhotra has led or supported multiple mid-to-late-stage epilepsy clinical trials and holds strong relationships with leading academic centers of excellence in epilepsy care.
Dr. Nishi is a pharmacologist and translational scientist who has led multiple drug discovery programs in neurological disorders and other therapeutic areas. He joins Ovid from Takeda Pharmaceuticals, where he played a critical role in the invention and development of soticlestat, a small molecule inhibitor of cholesterol 24-hydroxylase. Dr. Nishi collaborated with Ovid throughout the early clinical development of soticlestat. Soticlestat is now being evaluated by Takeda in two Phase 3 global clinical trials for the potential treatment of Dravet and Lennox-Gastaut syndromes. Dr. Nishi's work in epilepsy, Alzheimer's disease and other therapeutic areas is widely published. At Ovid, he will support preclinical development, including a dedicated focus on the KCC2 program.