Ernest Mario has been Chairman and CEO since 2007. After working as a drugstore pharmacist and then beginning his pharmaceutical industry career as a researcher in 1966, Dr. Mario served in management at a number of drug companies before being named in 1989 chief executive of Glaxo, then the second-largest drug company in the world. During Dr. Mario’s tenure, Glaxo brought five major new products to market and saw sales and profits increase by 15% annually. Later Dr. Mario led pioneering drug delivery technology company ALZA until selling it to Johnson & Johnson in 2001 in what was then one of the largest pharmaceutical industry mergers in history. Most recently he served as chairman and chief executive of Reliant Pharmaceuticals, where he led the commercialization of Omacor/Lovaza, the first and only prescription omega-3 medication clinically proven to dramatically reduce very high triglycerides.

Dr. Mario earned a BS in pharmacy at Rutgers and his MS and PhD in physical sciences at the University of Rhode Island. He holds honorary doctorates from URI and Rutgers, the latter of which in 2001 renamed its pharmacy school the Ernest Mario School of Pharmacy. In 2007 he was awarded the Remington Medal by the American Pharmacists’ Association, pharmacy’s highest honor.

In addition to his current and past service on a number of corporate boards, Dr. Mario is active in numerous educational and healthcare organizations, including Duke, where he is a former university trustee and chairman of the health system.

Anish Bhatnagar, MD is a physician with over 12 years of clinical and regulatory experience in the biopharmaceutical and medical device industry. His experience spans development of biologics, drugs, drug-device combinations and medical devices. He has extensive experience in the pharmaceutical industry in all aspects of drug and device development from pre-IND to Phase III and Expanded Access as well as BLA submission. Anish has implemented clinical trials in neurology, psychiatry, pulmonary/allergy, cardiovascular disease, endocrine/metabolic disease and hematology/oncology in North America, South America, Asia, Africa as well as Western and Eastern Europe. He has been the lead in regulatory interactions with several divisions at the FDA and international regulatory authorities (such as those in the UK, France, Australia and Sweden).

Anish has been at Capnia since 2006. His prior experience includes working at Coulter and Titan Pharmaceuticals at increasing levels of responsibility. He obtained his medical degree in Jaipur, India and completed his Residency and Fellowship training at Georgetown University Hospital and the University of Pennsylvania.

Scott Gilbert has specialized in the design and development of medical devices and drug delivery systems for more than 25 years. Prior to joining Capnia, he spent ten years in a variety of roles at ALZA Corporation, including Director of Product Engineering in the Implant Group, Director of Technology Assessment and Director of Advanced Drug Delivery. During his tenure at ALZA, Scott contributed to the DUROS Viadur product launch, evaluated dozens of drug delivery technologies worldwide, and directed research and development of new drug delivery systems, including novel oral gastric retention products and CO2-driven autoinjectors. Prior to ALZA, Scott was a co-founder and Vice-President of Accumetrics, a start-up company that developed a point-of-care platelet function assay for the bedside analysis of anti-thrombotic agents, and Director of Engineering at GVO, Inc., a well-known product design consulting firm working with Fortune 500 companies to innovate and design new products. He holds ten patents to date with another twelve patents pending, all in medical devices or drug delivery technologies. Mr. Gilbert has a BS in Industrial and Systems Engineering from San Jose State University.