Guardant Health Appoints Leena Das-Young to Lead Efforts to Develop Liquid Biopsy Products for Early-Stage Cancer Applications

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Jul 12, 2018, 14:00 ET

REDWOOD CITY, Calif., July 12, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Guardant Health announced that it has appointed Leena Das-Young, Pharm.D. to serve as General Manager of its LUNAR program. As Guardant Health's General Manager and Chief LUNAR Officer, Dr. Das-Young will oversee all work applying Guardant Health's technology and database of more than 70,000 clinical Guardant360® assay results, toward new applications in early-stage cancer, such as residual detection, recurrence monitoring, and early detection of cancer.

"We announced our LUNAR program in May of 2016 to expand the limited scope of precision oncology from personalized treatment in the metastatic setting to a new paradigm of care that encompasses precise detection, monitoring, and treatment selection across all stages of cancer," said Guardant Health Co-Founder and President AmirAli Talasaz, PhD. "Leena is a seasoned executive who brings extensive oncology drug development, approval and commercialization experience across a wide range of indications, and we are fortunate to have Leena to lead our LUNAR program."

"This is a dynamic time for cancer medicine, and I am thrilled to be joining Guardant Health," Dr. Das-Young said. "The opportunity to build upon the success of a well-validated assay in the advanced setting and positively impact patients with early stage cancers is both compelling and a real privilege. I look forward to working with the entire Guardant Health team on this exciting platform."

Dr. Das-Young was most recently the Vice President & Head of the Late Phase Strategy and Development Group in Pfizer in the Oncology group and was responsible for a portfolio of oncology programs including Ibrance, Xalkori, Besponsa, Sutent, lorlatinib, and others. Prior to her roles in product development, she served in increasingly senior commercial roles responsible for several successful launches in both Pfizer and Bayer. She received her B.S. and Doctor of Pharmacy degrees from Purdue University.

About Guardant Health, Inc.
Guardant Health is a leading precision oncology company focused on helping conquer cancer globally through use of its proprietary blood tests, vast data sets and advanced analytics. Its Guardant Health Oncology Platform is designed to leverage its capabilities in technology, clinical development, regulatory and reimbursement to drive commercial adoption, improve patient clinical outcomes and lower healthcare costs. In pursuit of its goal to manage cancer across all stages of the disease, Guardant Health has launched multiple liquid biopsy-based tests, Guardant360 and GuardantOMNI, for advanced stage cancer patients, which fuel its development programs for recurrence and early detection, LUNAR-1 and LUNAR-2, respectively. Since its launch in 2014, Guardant360 has become the world's market-leading comprehensive liquid biopsy test and has been used by more than 5,000 oncologists, over 40 biopharmaceutical companies and all 27 of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network Centers. Learn more at www.guardanthealth.com.

SOURCE Guardant Health