Press

The FDA has accepted EIT Pharma's New Drug Application for lonafarnib, putting a potential first oral therapy for chronic hepatitis D into formal review. This piece covers what the milestone means for a disease with no FDA-approved oral treatments in the U.S., the D-LIVR study behind the submission, and why CEO Leen Kawas points to oral dosing and room-temperature storage as practical advantages for patients and providers.

EIT Pharma has closed an oversubscribed $35 million Series A led by Propel Bio Partners. This piece covers what the round funds — FDA review, manufacturing, and commercial prep for lonafarnib, the Kirkland company's oral candidate for chronic hepatitis D — and how the asset came to EIT through the 2024 bankruptcy sale of Eiger BioPharmaceuticals.

Leen Kawas is back in an operating seat. This piece covers her return to running a company as CEO of EIT Pharma after several years focused on investing through Propel Bio Partners, the venture firm she co-founded with early Athira backer Richard Kayne, and what the move means for EIT's growth in Seattle.

The FDA has accepted the New Drug Application for Lonafarnib, EIT Pharma's first-in-class oral therapy for chronic hepatitis D, following the largest clinical trial ever conducted in the disease. This release covers the company's late-stage infectious disease pipeline under Dr. Leen Kawas's leadership, including its Phase 2 program for severe acute viral respiratory infections, and why she says these programs sit exactly where the industry should be focused.

Nine out of ten experimental drugs that enter human trials never make it to market, and Leen Kawas says the top reason is one the industry treats as unavoidable: nobody asked patients what mattered before the science was already locked in. This piece covers her patient-first investment thesis at Propel Bio Partners, with real examples from her own portfolio of what building backward from patient need actually looks like.

For decades, the most aggressive hepatitis virus in the world had no approved treatment in the U.S. — that changed in May 2026. Leen Kawas breaks down what makes hepatitis delta so dangerous, why the hepatitis B vaccine is the only line of defense against it, and why the route a drug is delivered by can matter as much as the drug itself for patients actually staying on treatment.

The slide that wins over a pitch room is usually the one with the steepest dose-response curve — and Leen Kawas has come to see that as one of biotech's most persistent self-deceptions. This post walks through the FDA's Project Optimus reforms, the cabazitaxel trial that proved a lower dose saved lives without losing efficacy, and why the dose a patient can sustain for years matters more than the one that looks best on a 12-week chart.

This press release profiles Dr. Leen Kawas as the executive behind EIT Pharma's lonafarnib program, offering a closer look at her background across drug development, venture investing, and biotech company building alongside the firm's EASL Congress 2026 presentations.

EIT Pharma, led by Dr. Leen Kawas, presented new analyses from the phase 3 D-LIVR trial at EASL Congress 2026 in Barcelona, adding to the evidence base for lonafarnib, currently the only oral therapy in late-stage development for chronic hepatitis D. The full press release covers what was presented, what the data shows, and where the program goes from here.

In this guest post for Life Science Daily News, Leen Kawas argues that biotech's real bottleneck isn't scientific, it's operational. Drawing on patterns she's seen across the industry, she breaks down why strong clinical data alone doesn't create a successful therapy, and what founders and investors need to get right before the data even reads out.

Leen Kawas traces her investment philosophy all the way back to her early days behind a pharmacy counter, and in this Substack post she builds a clear-eyed argument for why patient experience should shape drug development from day one, not just at the clinical trial stage.

Propel Bio Partners just closed a $100 million fund, a milestone that reflects the firm's growing conviction that late-stage biotech assets need more than capital to cross the finish line. Led by Dr. Leen Kawas and Richard Kayne, the Los Angeles-based venture/incubator hybrid pairs funding with hands-on clinical, regulatory, and commercialization support for companies developing therapies in rare disease, infectious disease, and oncology. The full press release details their

Leen Kawas has built her investment philosophy at Propel Bio Partners around a simple premise: most biotech startups don't fail because the science is wrong. They fail because founders underestimate how much operational discipline, hiring strategy, and commercialization planning matter alongside the research. The firm's latest press release breaks down how that founder-first approach is shaping their portfolio strategy across diagnostics, therapeutics, precision medicine, and

Scientific expertise alone no longer defines the best biotech leaders. Kawas makes the case for cross-disciplinary thinking — and her own career from pharmacist to VC is the proof of concept.

Kawas makes the case that female leadership in life sciences isn't a diversity initiative — it's a performance advantage, and the data backs her up.

Scientific breakthroughs that only reach a fraction of patients aren't truly breakthroughs. Kawas built her investment philosophy around a simple conviction: accessibility isn't separate from innovation — it's the measure of it.

Most biotech founders treat advisory boards as a formality. Kawas argues they're one of the most consequential structural decisions a startup can make — and almost always built too late.

Propel Bio Partners is expanding its focus on early-stage healthcare startups across diagnostics, therapeutics, precision medicine, and digital health — built on the belief that great science alone isn't enough, and that founders need operational guidance and strategic support as much as capital.

Propel Bio Partners’ appointment of healthcare veteran Laurie Heilmann as Venture Partner is more than a senior hire. It signals how Leen Kawas is building real infrastructure for the hardest phase in biotech: the leap from validated concept to global commercialization and strategic exit. The piece explains why scale-up and launch experience is rare, how Heilmann’s track record (exits, IPOs, and international operations) strengthens portfolio companies’ positioning for partne

With biotech venture funding far tighter than it was in the 2021 boom, early-stage companies are learning a hard truth: capital alone does not de-risk drug development. Leen Kawas argues that in today’s market, operational expertise, strategic guidance, and high-leverage networks are what keep promising science alive between long funding cycles. Using Propel Bio Partners’ venture partner model, including the appointment of seasoned operator Laurie Heilmann, she lays out why l