Kelly Neelon, PhD, is Chief Technical Officer at Mentari Therapeutics. She is a CMC and technical operations leader with more than 25 years of experience in biotech and pharma—specializing in drug product development, formulation, and manufacturing across biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies.

Prior to joining Mentari, Kelly served as Senior Vice President, Technical Operations, Quality, and Program Management, at X4 Pharmaceuticals, where she provided leadership through CMC operations and program and alliance management. Before that, Kelly served as Vice President, CMC and Technical Operations, at Vigil Neuroscience, where she managed internal and external CMC teams responsible for large and small molecule process development. Earlier, Kelly was Vice President, Technical Operations, at Phoenix Tissue Repair (BridgeBio) and held roles of increasing responsibility in CMC leadership and drug product formulation and development at TESARO, Momenta, and Dyax. Kelly earned her PhD in biochemistry from Boston College and graduated from University of Massachusetts Lowell with a master’s degree in chemical engineering.