Recorded on 09/18/25.

TD Cowen analyst Yaron Werber speaks with Ron Renaud, a Wall Street biotech veteran who turned into a seasoned biotech CEO and chairman of boards, as he outlines his decision to helm Kailera Therapeutics as President and CEO. Ron lays out Kailera's vision in obesity, a field that underpins one of the key global healthcare challenges. Backed by a $400M Series A and a strategic partnership with Jiangsu Hengrui, a large global pharma based in China with deep peptide chemistry expertise, the company is advancing both an injectable dual GLP1/GIP1 agonist and an oral GLP1 program to create a comprehensive, leading, late-stage, metabolic portfolio. Ron emphasizes how the partnership with Hengrui accelerates data flow and strategic decision-making. He stresses that guiding Kailera's growth requires the same principles he applies broadly in biotech: transparency, trust, surrounding yourself with great people, and stimulating the best in innovation and cooperation from the team.

Ron also shares lessons from his impressive career spanning equity research, multiple biotech CEO roles, and three successful acquisitions by pharma (Idenix, Translate Bio, Cerevel) for a total $16B in value. He emphasizes that companies “get bought, not sold” — meaning value comes from building strong, enduring organizations with the right people and differentiated foundations.

On leadership, Ron highlights the importance of transparency with boards and employees, especially during turbulent times of strategic refocusing/change, pipeline reprioritization, and recognizing the importance of every employee within a company. He stresses that good decision-making often comes from admitting what you don’t know and being unafraid to ask. For aspiring CEOs, he recommends surrounding yourself with trusted mentors and collaborators, focusing on culture as much as science, and learning to navigate nonlinear processes.

If he wasn’t a biotech CEO, Ron would opt to be a teacher. Lastly, on a fun note, when asked to choose between jumping out of a plane or scuba diving to the bottom of the ocean, Ron, an avid fisherman, says that he would pick scuba diving because of his deep love of the ocean, as he can always figure out a way back to the surface.

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