David Pyrce Joins DevaCell as Chief Executive Officer
Company Transitioning to Clinical Development in 2021
SAN DIEGO, Oct. 29, 2020 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- DevaCell Inc. today announced that David Pyrce has joined the company as Chief Executive Officer. Mr. Pyrce brings over 30 years of biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry leadership, together with deep Wall Street experience and will lead all aspects of DevaCell's growth strategy focused on the development of ONCoatTM-enabled, synthetic vector-based therapeutics across three key market segments - oncolytic viral therapy, vaccines, and gene therapy/gene editing.
"We are very pleased to welcome David into leadership of the DevaCell team," said Larry Stambaugh, Chairman of DevaCell. "David's extensive biotech and pharma drug development expertise, and proven executive management skills, will significantly accelerate DevaCell at a time when management is focusing on transitioning the company's novel synthetic vector-based therapeutics into the clinic by mid-year 2021." Mr. Stambaugh continued, "In addition, David's extensive long-term relationships on Wall Street, as well as the biotech and pharma industries, will be key to securing strategic capital partners to fund preclinical and clinical development activities, together with establishing biotech and pharma collaborators, that will create additional clinical programs using DevaCell's pipeline of next generation therapeutics."
Mr. Pyrce is a biotech, pharma and Wall Street veteran, mostly recently serving as Senior Vice President, Strategy, Innovations and Chief Commercial Officer of NantKwest, a cell therapy company. Prior to NantKwest, David was the Founder, Chairman and CEO of Genomic Principles, a molecular diagnostics and neoantigen-based therapeutics company. Earlier in his career, David held executive management positions in business development, marketing and sales for BioMarin Pharmaceuticals/Glyko, Glaxo/SmithKline Beecham, and Baxter Healthcare. On Wall Street, David was the Founder, CEO and Managing General Partner of Bear Creek Capital Management and Bear Creek Capital Partners, a healthcare-focused hedge fund. David was also Senior Sell-Side Analyst at Wells Fargo Securities. David received his MBA from the Stuart School at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, and has dual bachelor degrees in Chemistry and Biology from Northern Illinois University.
Inanc Ortac, Ph.D, Founder and Chief Scientific Officer of DevaCell commented, "It is an honor, especially at our current pivotal stage of moving into clinical programs, to have David bring his deep skill set, from startup entrepreneur to successfully completing multiple IPOs and help to translate our platform technology to a truly transformative product pipeline of high impact therapeutics," Dr. Ortac continued, "The innovative science and development of DevaCell's platform technology from discovery to preclinical development over the past several years has positioned the company very well to become a leader in next-generation therapeutics. We welcome David to the DevaCell team."
Mr. Pyrce commented, "I take great pride in being trusted with the role of CEO at DevaCell. As the coronavirus pandemic has shown, the need for innovative, next generation therapies has never been greater and I truly believe that DevaCell's synthetic vector-based therapeutics platform is truly game changing, offering the potential to deliver highly effective therapeutics on a systemic basis, while also enabling repeat administration, something that has not been previously available." Mr. Pyrce continued, "With a focused strategy to transition the company's first therapeutics program into human clinical trials in 2021, the company is at a key inflection point, and I'm honored to be given the opportunity to help bring novel, high-impact therapeutics to patients as quickly as possible."
About DevaCell Inc
DevaCell is a San Diego based synthetic vector-based therapeutics firm focused on developing a product pipeline of best-in-class therapeutics across three key segments: Oncolytic virus therapies, vaccines, and gene therapy/gene editing applications. DevaCell's DEVA (designer encapsulated viral assembly) is the foundational innovation for the company's transformative nanoparticle-based, ONCoatTM synthetic vector platform technology, which is enabling the development of a portfolio of innovative therapeutic products candidates. The company's lead oncolytic virus program includes product candidates that have been engineered to express multiple transgenes that include novel combinations of immunomodulators, checkpoint inhibitors, and ligands for T-cell costimulatory or coinhibitory receptors and metabolic modifiers. In preclinical development is an infectious disease vaccine for COVID-19, and in discovery research are applications in gene therapy/gene editing.
Contact
DevaCell Inc
David Pyrce
951-551-0949
[email protected]
DevaCell.com
SOURCE DevaCell Inc.
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