| Item 5.02. |
Departure of Directors or Certain Officers; Election of Directors; Appointment of Certain Officers; Compensatory Arrangements of Certain Officers. |
On February 15, 2024, Michael Wong gave notice of his resignation as Vice President, Finance, of Alaunos Therapeutics, Inc. (the “Company”), effective February 23, 2024.
On February 22, 2024, the Company and Ferdinand Groenewald entered into a consulting agreement (the “Consulting Agreement”), effective February 22, 2024, pursuant to which Mr. Groenewald will lead accounting and financial reporting activities of the Company. Mr. Groenewald will serve as the Company’s Vice President, Finance. The Consulting Agreement will continue indefinitely until terminated by either party upon 30 days’ advance notice. The Consulting Agreement provides for compensation at a fixed rate of $15,000 per month and reimbursement by the Company for any usual and customary business expenses incurred by Mr. Groenewald in connection with performing services pursuant to the Consulting Agreement. In addition, the Consulting Agreement provides for the Company to indemnify Mr. Groenewald on terms customary for officers.
Since July 2022, Mr. Groenewald, age 39, has served in several capacities at the CFO Squad, which provides outsourced accounting and consulting services. From January 2, 2022 to July 31, 2022, Mr. Groenewald had served as the Chief Accounting Officer of Muscle Maker, Inc., a Nasdaq-listed company. From September 2018 to January 2, 2022, Mr. Groenewald served as the Chief Financial Officer of Muscle Maker, Inc. From January 25, 2018 through May 29, 2018, Mr. Groenewald served as the Vice President of Finance, Principal Financial Officer and Principal Accounting Officer of Muscle Maker, Inc., Muscle Maker Development, LLC and Muscle Maker Corp., LLC. In addition, from October 2017 through May 29, 2018, he served as the controller of Muscle Maker, Inc. Mr. Groenewald is a certified public accountant with significant experience in finance and accounting. From July 2018 through August 2018, he served as senior financial reporting accountant of Wrinkle Gardner & Company, a full-service tax, accounting and business consulting firm. From February 2017 to October 2017, Mr. Groenewald served as Senior Financial Accounting Consultant at Pharos Advisors, Inc. serving a broad range of industries. From November 2013 to February 2017, he served as a Senior Staff Accountant at Financial Consulting Strategies, LLC, where he provided a broad range of accounting, financial reporting, and pre-auditing services to various industries. From August 2015 to December 2015, Mr. Groenewald served as a Financial Reporting Analyst at Valley National Bank. Mr. Groenewald holds a Bachelor of Science in accounting from the University of South Africa. Mr. Groenewald has served as a member of the Board of Directors of (i) HeartCore Enterprises, Inc., a company listed on the Nasdaq Capital Market, since January 24, 2022; (ii) SYLA Technologies Co., Ltd., a publicly reporting company that is listed on the Nasdaq Capital Market, since December 1, 2022; and (iii) Sushi Ginza Onodera, Inc., a company that has publicly filed a registration statement on Form S-1 in connection with its initial public offering, since July 1, 2023.
The foregoing description of the Consulting Agreement does not purport to be complete and is qualified in its entirety by reference to the full text of such agreement, which will be filed as an exhibit to the Company’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2023.