Oxford BioTherapeutics Strengthens Board of Directors with Appointment of Two Biotech Veterans

SAN JOSE, California and OXFORD, England, February 9, 2017 /PRNewswire/ --

Oxford BioTherapeutics ("OBT"), an international biotechnology company developing clinical stage antibody therapeutics for cancer, today announced a significant strengthening of its oncology focused Board of Directors with the appointment of Bernd Seizinger M.D., Ph.D. as Chairman and Jean-Pierre Bizzari, M.D. as a non-executive director, joining Glenn Begley, Shawn Tomasello, Tom Bradley and Christian Rohlff.

Bernd Seizinger brings over 20 years of industry experience, from a number of senior executive board positions in pharma and biotech companies on both sides of the Atlantic. These include Bristol-Myers Squibb (VP oncology drug discovery and VP Corporate and Academic alliances), GPC Biotech (CEO and President), and Chairman of Aprea, Opsona and CryptoMedix.

Speaking about his appointment Dr Seizinger said "Oxford BioTherapeutics has considerable momentum, progressing an exciting immuno-oncology and ADC pipeline, as well as our fully-funded partnered pipeline. Our corporate evolution is now driven by our broad-scale ability to discover and translate novel targets into biologics drug candidates with compelling in vivo anti-tumor activity."  

Jean-Pierre Bizzari brings 32 years' experience including as EVP and Group Head of Clinical Oncology at Celgene until 2015, and Sanofi Aventis prior to that, and has directed the clinical development and approval of a number of important anti-cancer medicines.

Jean-Pierre Bizzari commenting on his appointment "I am excited to be joining Oxford BioTherapeutics at this pivotal moment.  I believe the Company's broad pipeline of next generation immuno-oncology candidates against novel checkpoint targets has significant potential to produce transformative medicines."

Christian Rohlff, PhD, Oxford BioTherapeutics' chief executive officer, said " We are honored to be welcoming Bernd Seizinger as Chairman, and Jean-Pierre Bizzari as a non-executive director. These appointments of world-renowned experts will support Oxford BioTherapeutics' transition into a clinical-stage oncology therapeutics development company, with a mature, well-funded clinical ADC/C pipeline and a disruptive early second generation I-O pipeline."

About Oxford BioTherapeutics 

Oxford BioTherapeutics is an international, clinical-stage biotechnology company developing antibody therapeutics for cancer.  Combining next generation immuno-oncology, ADC* and fully human monoclonal antibody approaches against novel human tumor cell membrane-derived checkpoint targets identified using its unique target selection and validation platform, the Company has gathered compelling in vivo evidence of the potency of its broad pipeline.

Oxford BioTherapeutics' pipeline comprises of 16 product candidates, including 2 clinical and pre-clinical stage programs partnered with Menarini, 8 unpartnered ADC programs, 5 immuno-oncology programs and 2 pre-clinical stage programs partnered with Boehringer Ingelheim.

The Company's most advanced candidate is in the clinic.  MEN1112 (OBT357) is an ADCC** antibody in a phase I trial in Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML) patients, which is showing early signals of activity and is continuing to enroll patients.  MEN1309 (OBT076), an ADC for Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma (NHL), "triple negative" metastatic breast cancer and other solid cancers is on track for first-in-human trials beginning in mid-2017. Oxford BioTherapeutics' therapies have already shown marked in vivo anti-tumor activity in patient-derived xenographs. The Company also has multiple independent ADCs at IND enabling stage and a unique immuno-oncology discovery platform for novel immuno-oncology targets, with the first of these candidates likely to be at IND-enabling in 2018.

Oxford BioTherapeutics has struck two significant development deals commercially validating its unique target selection and development capabilities, most recently a large collaboration with Menarini worth up to €800 million. This partnership fully funds the clinical development of five product candidates to phase II proof-of-concept, while Oxford BioTherapeutics retains US and Japan commercial rights.

Oxford BioTherapeutics has a strong oncology specialist management team and board with significant experience in developing immuno-oncology and antibody-based therapies. The company is based in Oxford, UK, and San Jose, CA. For further information, please see http://www.oxfordbiotherapeutics.com

*Antibody-drug conjugates

**ADCC: Antibody-dependent cell-mediated cytotoxicity

Media Contacts:
Sylvie Berrebi
Citigate Dewe Rogerson                
Tel: +44(0)20-7282-1052        
[email protected]

Dr. Christian Rohlff                
Oxford BioTherapeutics                    
+44(0)1235-861770            
[email protected]

SOURCE Oxford BioTherapeutics