Management Team

Lisa Ricciardi
Chief Executive Officer

Ms. Ricciardi has served as our chief executive officer and president since March 2020 and as a member of our board of directors since March 2019. From July 2018 to October 2019, she served as CEO of Suono Bio, a biotech company based on Langer Labs (MIT) technology. Prior to her position at Suono Bio, Ms. Ricciardi was a retained executive for BioBusiness Links from November 2015 to June 2018 where she performed interim operating executive and advisory board roles. She served as the senior vice president of global corporate & business development of Foundation Medicine from July 2014 to November 2015, and senior vice president of U.S. and international business development of Express Scripts from October 2010 to October 2012 and in both cases, led deal teams to sell the two companies. Ms. Ricciardi was in the commercial division of Pfizer Inc., taking three drugs to launch before being appointed by the chairman to run global business development. Ms. Ricciardi previously served on the boards of Contrafect (Nasdaq: CFRX), Chimerix (Nasdaq: CMRX), United Drug Healthcare Group, PLC (LSE: UDG) and Sepracor (Nasdaq: SEPR). She was appointed as the executive in residence at Columbia Technology Ventures in January 2020.

Ms. Ricciardi earned a Bachelor of Arts degree cum laude in English and religion from Wesleyan University and an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Management.

Lisa Ricciardi

Chief Executive Officer

James M. O’Brien
Chief Financial Officer

Mr. O’Brien has served as our Chief Financial Officer since October 2019. From February 2014 to October 2019, Mr. O’Brien served as Executive Vice President of finance for Enzo Biochem, Inc. (NYSE: ENZ), a biotechnology company providing reference laboratory services to the medical community. From November 2010 to June 2013, Mr. O’Brien served as Vice President and Corporate Controller for Allergan, Inc., (formerly known as Actavis plc.) which has now been acquired by Abbvie (NYSE: ABBV), a pharmaceutical company. He also previously served as a Vice President at Takeda Pharmaceuticals (NYSE: TAK) (formerly known as Nycomed) from January 2010 to August 2010, Chief Accounting Officer at USI Holdings from January 2008 to August 2009, and Vice President and Corporate Controller at Aptuit, an Evotec company (Frankfurt Stock Exchange: EVT) and pharmaceutical services provider, from July 2005 to December 2007. Mr. O’Brien also held leadership roles at Purdue Pharma, Bristol-Myers Squibb and PricewaterhouseCoopers in the earlier stages of his career.

Mr. O’Brien is a certified public accountant (CPA) with a Bachelor of Accountancy from George Washington University and an MBA from Fordham University.

James M. O’Brien

Chief Financial Officer

Anthony O. Caggiano, M.D., Ph.D.
Chief Medical Officer, Head of R&D

Dr. Caggiano has broad experience in the development of new medicines for neurological conditions. During his 17 years at Acorda Therapeutics, the last four as senior vice president of research and development, Dr. Caggiano oversaw preclinical and clinical development programs in neurological conditions such as multiple sclerosis, stroke and spinal cord injury. In addition, he directed a large team responsible for all aspects of early development through a combination of internal research efforts and external research collaborations. He built relationships with thought leaders, developed clinical trial strategies and participated in licensing activities.

Immediately prior to joining Cognition, Dr. Caggiano was chief medical officer and head of R&D for Neurotrauma Sciences, a biopharmaceutical company developing therapies to treat the effects of stroke and TBI. Earlier in his career, he served as acting president and chief medical officer of Constant Pharmaceuticals and Aeromics, Inc., clinical-stage companies respectively developing candidates for central nervous system disorders and cerebral edema following ischemic stroke.

Dr. Caggiano earned his Bachelor of Arts from the University of Virginia in interdisciplinary studies, focusing on biology, chemistry and psychology. He earned his doctoral degree from the University of Chicago and his medical degree from the University of Chicago, Pritzker School of Medicine.

Anthony O. Caggiano, M.D., Ph.D.

Chief Medical Officer, Head of R&D

Mary Hamby, Ph.D.
Vice President, Research

Dr. Mary Hamby is vice president of research at Cognition Therapeutics. In this role, she is focused on the discovery and development of disease-modifying therapeutics to help treat patients with age-related diseases including Alzheimer’s disease and dementia with Lewy bodies. Dr. Hamby leads research efforts aimed at identifying next generation clinical candidates to advance to IND-enabling studies. In this role, she oversees the discovery and development of small molecule σ-2 modulators that block the toxic effects that pathogenic proteins elicit on neurons.

Her work at Cognition builds upon her career in drug discovery, spanning target validation, proof of concept, clinical candidate selection and early clinical development. Prior to joining Cognition, Dr. Hamby was the head of neuroinflammation at the Neurodegeneration Consortium at MD Anderson where she led efforts to discover novel therapeutics, advance a portfolio of drug discovery programs and nominate clinical biomarkers of Alzheimer’s disease. Prior to joining the Neurodegeneration Consortium, Dr. Hamby was a research scientist at Lundbeck where she generated key in vitro and in vivo proof-of-concept data that enabled target identification and validation and helped guide development of Lundbeck’s lead CNS candidates.

She received her Ph.D. in biomedical science specializing in neuroscience from University of Connecticut and conducted her post-doctoral training at University of California Los Angeles. Her career comprises over 20 years of experience in the fields of neurodegenerative diseases and drug discovery in both academia and pharma/biotech.

Mary Hamby, Ph.D.

Vice President, Research