Primary Job Title President and Co-founder Primary Organization 
Meryx
Location Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States Regions Research Triangle, East Coast, Southern US Gender Male
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Stephen Frye is an Eshelman Distinguished Professor and Director of the Center for Integrative Chemical Biology and Drug Discovery (CICBDD) at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the President of Meryx. He is also the lead principal investigator for the North Carolina Comprehensive Chemical Biology Center, a University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill based, NCI designated center that engages in oncology drug discovery. He began his professional career as a medicinal chemist at Glaxo, and subsequently led the program that resulted in Avodart, GlaxoSmithKline’s (GSK) dual 5α-reductase inhibitor for treatment of benign prostatic hyperplasia, as well as founding and heading the department that discovered two FDA approved kinase inhibitors: Tykerb (a dual erbB2/EGFR inhibitor approved for the treatment of metastatic breast cancer); and Pazopanib (approved for renal carcinoma). He ultimately led GSK’s High Throughput and Discovery Medicinal Chemistry (DMC) global function. Over the seven years Dr. Frye led DMC, the group grew to more than 200 chemists and developed global protein target-class chemical science and a compound collection strategy that enhanced both the productivity and quality of GSK’s hit and lead generation across all therapeutic areas. Dr. Frye joined the UNC-CH School of Pharmacy in 2007 to create the CICBDD in cooperation with the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center and the School of Medicine. He received his BS in chemistry from North Carolina State University, and his Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
