President & CEO

Martin B. Wax M.D. is a clinician-scientist and pharmaceutical industry executive. Dr. Wax was the co-founder and Chief Medical Officer/Executive Vice-President of R&D at PanOptica, Inc., a private biotechnology company specializing in ophthalmic pharmaceuticals, from 2009-2019 where he developed a topical anti-VEGF eye drop for wet AMD that is currently licensed to a Chinese pharmaceutical company for an undisclosed sum. Prior to that, he was Vice President of R&D and Head of Ophthalmology Discovery Research and Preclinical Sciences at Alcon Laboratories in Ft. Worth, Texas from 2003-2008 where he was responsible for the creation and development of the Alcon pharmaceutical portfolio of compounds for the therapeutic areas of glaucoma, retina, allergy, dry eye and anti-infectives. Prior to entering industry as the head of Ophthalmology Research at Pharmacia Corporation in 2002, he held the distinguished Research to Prevent Blindness Chair as a Professor of Ophthalmology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, MO.

Dr. Wax has chaired numerous national and international commercial advisory boards for industry sponsors throughout his academic and industry career and has coauthored more than 200 publications including peer-reviewed articles, abstracts and chapter in books and is an internationally recognized scientific expert in the field of glaucoma. His research has focused on the cell biology of aqueous humor formation and the role of the immune system in glaucomatous optic neuropathy.

Dr. Wax received his medical degree from the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. He completed his residency in Ophthalmology at Wills Eye Hospital in Pennsylvania and was a postdoctoral fellow first in Neuropharmacology and then in Glaucoma at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine in Philadelphia.

Vice President Finance & Chief Financial Officer

François Mongrain has more than 20 years of financial experience centered on technology, growth-oriented businesses. During his 9 years in Entrepreneurial Services and Merger & Acquisition at Ernst & Young, he worked with several technology companies primarily active in the health care sector.

Following his Ernst & Young years, he became a founding partner of BridgeCapital Inc., a private consulting firm offering strategic and financial expertise to biotechnology companies. Through his years at E&Y and BridgeCapital, Mr. Mongrain played instrumental roles in more than 12 start-ups and participated in several IPO and private placements for young emerging companies.

Prior to Mimetogen, Mr. Mongrain co-founded Innodia, a biotech company focusing its R&D activity in developing novel drug for the treatment of diabetes and obesity. As Vice President Finance & CFO and then Chief Operating Officer, he successfully financed the Company’s research & development operations over a six-year period prior to orchestrating the sale of the Company to a publicly-listed Canadian biotechnology Company.

François received a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the Ecole des Hautes Etudes Commerciales (Montreal) and earned his Charted Accountant designation with Ernst & Young in 1993.

Vice President, Clinical Development

Karen Meerovitch has over 20 years of experience in drug discovery and development in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry. At Mimetogen, Dr. Meerovitch started as the Company’s Senior Scientist and now serves as Vice President, overseeing all CMC, non-clinical, clinical and regulatory development activities of tavilermide.

Prior to joining Mimetogen, she was Group Leader for all preclinical activities at Avance Pharma (Laval, Quebec). Prior to that she was Senior Scientist at Shire Biochem (Laval, Quebec), where she was a key contributor in the discovery and research of several projects in oncology drug discovery programs in the area of angiogenesis, apoptosis, and vascular targeting. Dr. Meerovitch holds an appointment as Adjunct Professor at McGill University in the Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics. She is author or co-author of over 20 publications and reviews.

Dr. Meerovitch holds a B.Sc. and PhD. from McGill University and an M.Sc. from the University of Alberta, all in Biochemistry. She also completed her post-doctoral fellowship in the Department of Medicine at McGill University.

Chief Medical Advisor

Dr. Pepose has nearly 40 years of experience as both a treating physician and a widely published researcher.  He is the founder and current Medical Director of the Pepose Vision Institute and a professor of Clinical Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences at Washington University School of Medicine in St-Louis.  Dr. Pepose is actively involved in clinical trials and has served as an investigator on over 30 studies evaluating new therapeutics and technology in a broad range of ophthalmic indications, including dry eye.  He has published over 200 peer-reviewed articles and has served on the editorial boards of several prestigious ophthalmology journals.  Dr. Pepose is the recipient of numerous honors and awards, including the prestigious Cogan award from the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology. He is recognized in "Best Doctors in America" and "America's Top Docs" as a noted subspecialist in cataract, corneal and vision correction surgery.

Dr. Pepose received an A.B. and M.A. in neurophysiology from Brandeis University and completed the M.D.-Ph.D. program at the UCLA School of Medicine.  Dr. Pepose completed his ophthalmology residency at the Wilmer Institute at the Johns Hopkins Medical Center and his fellowship training at Georgetown University Medical Center.