Company Management


Ilya Kuchuk, Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer and Board Member
As the Chief Executive Officer and Founder, Dr. Kuchuk leads AsisChem's research and development efforts. He has over fifteen years of experience in industry and university research. Prior to AsisChem Dr. Kuchuk worked for Starks Associates Inc. in Buffalo, NY, where he excelled in process development and preparation of variety of drug candidates and became an expert in a variety of custom projects. Dr. Kuchuk received his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from St. Petersburg State University, Russia.

Jim Elgart, CPA, Chief Financial Officer
Jim Elgart is a financial professional and entrepreneur with two decades of experience in building businesses and the necessary infrastructure for those businesses to succeed. Jim has built businesses from the ground up in a variety of industries and locations. His assignments have taken him from CPA firm partner, to advertising agency CFO to overseeing the finances at AsisChem. Jim has effectively built businesses in Latin America, North America, and Europe. Jim is currently the part-time CFO of Jove (the Journal of Visualized Experiments), AsisChem, Inc., and Human Capital Consultants. Jim earned his BA in economics from Boston University as well as an MBA and MA in Latin American Studies from Tulane University. Jim is a Licensed CPA in Massachusetts.

Mikhail Kuznetsov, Ph.D., Director of Chemistry
Dr. Kuznetsov has over thirty five years of experience in synthetic organic chemisty. He authored and co-authored over a hundred scientific publications and is a highly regarded expert in the field of chemistry of heterocyclic compounds. Professor Kuznetsov received his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from St. Petersburg State University, Russia.

Natalia Labeysh, Ph.D., Director of Operations
Dr. Labeysh is responsible for all lab operations at AsisChem's research sites and kilo laboratory. She has over 25 years experience in synthetic organic chemistry and has previously served as a general manager for IRIX Neva. She recieved her doctorate degree from St. Petersburg Technological Institute.


Medicinal Chemistry Team

Joel Berniac, Ph.D.
Dr. Joel Berniac has over 10 years of experience in Medicinal Chemistry and drug discovery. After obtaining a PhD in Organic Chemistry from the University of Notre Dame in Indiana, Joel worked at Bayer Pharmaceuticals where he managed a fully equiped medicinal chemistry laboratory and worked in rational drug design, hit-to-lead, lead optimization, and pre-clinical candidate selection including animal models, pharmaco-kinetics, pharmaco-dynamics, oral bioavailability and blood-brain barrier permeability. His therapeutic areas of focus at Bayer were CNS targets with obesity, and diabetes. He then continued his medicinal chemistry career at Paratek Pharmaceuticals, Inc up to Principal Scientist, where, working closely with computational chemists and biologists, he developed novel tetracycline analogs for use against drug-resistant bacterial infections, malaria, multiple sclerosis, and rheumatoid arthritis. As a project coordinator at Paratek, he also worked on drug candidates for Spinal Muscle Atrophy (SMA), an orphan genetic disease, overseeing the design and synthesis of all target analogs. More recently, Joel has been providing Medicinal Chemistry support and consultation for AsisChem and AsisChem clients.

J Henry-Georges Lombart, Ph.D.
Dr Lombart is an expert in Medicinal Chemistry. Dr. Lombart received his Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the University of Montreal in 1998 under the supervision of Professor William Lubell and his research focused on the development of peptidomimetics. Then he completed a postdoctoral fellowship under the supervision of Professor Ian Paterson at the University of Cambridge, England, where his research involved the total synthesis of the macrolide Elaiolide as well as the synthesis of polyketide libraries using solid phase aldol methodology. Dr. Lombart started his industrial career for a the contract research organization at Albany Molecular Research, Albany, NY as a Senior Research Chemist in the Medicinal Chemistry Department. After he worked in the Discovery Medicinal Chemistry Department at Pfizer (Legacy Wyeth Research, Cambridge, MA) as a Principal Research Scientist for 10 years. He assumed leadership roles for some discovery programs in a broad range of targets including kinases, GPCRs or phospholipases with applications in therapeutic areas such as inflammation and cardiovascular disease areas. Dr. Lombart has experience in medicinal chemistry in all aspects of structured-based drug design, lead generation, and optimization of drug-like properties of small molecules.

Visit our products and services sections to learn more or contact us for additional information.
Visit our blog.
Discovery Accelerated.
to read about trends and news