745: Origins of a Come Back Therapy | Troy Ignelzi, CFO, Karuna Therapeutics

Troy Ignelzi’s CFO career is rooted in an unlikely place. In fact, some might describe it as the least likely of all places, for the environs of his early vocational path were not those of a growing company but instead a place where businesses had stopped growing. So it was in Kalamazoo, Michigan, in the late 1990s when Ignelzi—part of a local economic development team—became tasked with creating jobs in the wake of Pfizer’s decision to remove a number of business operations from the region, including a large plant. “They moved all of the R&D jobs and everything business-related out of Kalamazoo and Portage, Michigan, and all they left was a very large manufacturing plant,” explains Ignelzi, who notes that the move by Pfizer began putting the area’s larger biotech sector at risk. “What happened was that this big vacuum got created, so what we said was, ‘Let’s keep these other smart guys in town,’” continues Ignelzi, who adds that preserving the region’s biotech jobs became part of a bigger project known as the “Pfizer Disaster Relief Plan.” As Ignelzi diligently worked to crack the code for job creation inside the biotech realm, he increasingly found his interests leaping well beyond the region’s economic ebb and flow. Comments Ignelzi: “What first drew me to economic development was the idea of helping companies to create jobs and making a difference. Then this passion kind of spilled over into companies in the pharmaceutical and the biotech worlds, where firms were developing life-changing medicines.” To date, Ignelzi says, he has helped to lead the financing of six approved drugs representing different therapeutic areas and has helped seven different companies to go public.  Meanwhile, it’s clearly a point of pride for Ignelzi that Kalamazoo’s once empty biotech plant is today playing a part in the greater biotech community’s COVID response. Says Ignelzi: “It’s that same manufacturing plant that is now making the pandemic therapy that we’re all hoping gets us through this right now, right down the street from where I still live, in western Michigan.” –Jack Sweeney