Inovio Pharmaceuticals Appoints DNA Immunotherapy Pioneer David B. Weiner, Ph.D., to its Board of Directors
March 11 2016 - 8:00AM
Inovio Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:INO) announced today that
David B. Weiner, Ph.D., recognized in scientific circles as the
“father of DNA vaccines and immunotherapies,” has been appointed to
Inovio’s Board of Directors. Dr. Weiner was co-founder with J.
Joseph Kim, Ph.D., Inovio’s CEO, of VGX Pharmaceuticals in 2000;
via merger VGX later became Inovio Pharmaceuticals. Dr. Weiner will
continue to serve as Chair of the company’s Scientific Advisory
Board, a position he has held since the formation of the company in
2000.
Dr. Weiner recently joined The Wistar Institute,
the nation’s first independent biomedical research institute,
NCI-designated Cancer Center, and an international leader in
cancer, immunology and infectious disease research, as Executive
Vice President, Director of its Vaccine Center, and the W. W. Smith
Charitable Trust Endowed Professorship in Cancer Research. On March
1, Dr. Weiner retired as Emeritus Professor, Department of
Pathology & Laboratory Medicine at the University of
Pennsylvania and Chair of the Gene Therapy and Vaccine Program at
the University’s Perelman School of Medicine.
Dr. J. Joseph Kim, Inovio's President and CEO,
said, "Innovation is central to our company and its potential.
While our board has deep expertise in corporate development and
product commercialization, a strategic perspective on key
scientific and competitive trends is important to guide critical
corporate strategy and investment decisions. David’s achievements
have recast how we now think of vaccines – as treatments and cures
versus solely methods of disease prevention – and significantly
advanced the potential for paradigm-shifting immunotherapies. His
knowledge and judgment will be invaluable to Inovio as we continue
to advance differentiated immunotherapy technology to become
valuable medicines.”
Dr. Weiner is a world-renowned leader in
immunology as well as gene vaccines and immunotherapy. He has more
than 350 peer-reviewed publications in scientific journals,
including mainstream scientific journals such as Scientific
American, and has been designated by the Institute for Scientific
Information as one of the top-cited scientists in the world. An
inventor of more than 100 issued and pending US patents, Dr. Weiner
has received numerous honors including election as a fellow to the
American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2011 and the
International Society for Vaccines in 2012. He was the recipient of
the NIH Director’s Transformative Research Award and received the
Vaccine Industry Excellence Award for Best Academic Research Team
in 2015 at the World Vaccine Congress. Weiner was honored with the
prestigious Hilleman Lectureship in 2015 at the Children’s Hospital
of Philadelphia Grand Rounds session and received a Stone Family
Award from Abramson Cancer Center for his groundbreaking work on
DNA vaccines for cancer immune therapy.
David Weiner holds a Ph.D. in developmental
biology from the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, an
M.S. in biology from the University of Cincinnati. and a B.S. in
biology from SUNY at Stony Brook in Stony Brook, N.Y.
About Inovio Pharmaceuticals,
Inc.
Inovio is taking immunotherapy to the next level
in the fight against cancer and infectious diseases. We are the
only immunotherapy company that has reported generating T cells in
vivo in high quantity that are fully functional and whose killing
capacity correlates with relevant clinical outcomes with a
favorable safety profile. With an expanding portfolio of immune
therapies, the company is advancing a growing preclinical and
clinical stage product pipeline. Partners and collaborators include
MedImmune, Roche, University of Pennsylvania, DARPA, GeneOne Life
Science, Drexel University, NIH, HIV Vaccines Trial Network,
National Cancer Institute, U.S. Military HIV Research Program, and
University of Manitoba. For more information, visit
www.inovio.com.
This press release contains certain
forward-looking statements relating to our business, including our
plans to develop electroporation-based drug and gene delivery
technologies and DNA vaccines, our expectations regarding our
research and development programs and our capital resources. Actual
events or results may differ from the expectations set forth herein
as a result of a number of factors, including uncertainties
inherent in pre-clinical studies, clinical trials and product
development programs (including, but not limited to, the fact that
pre-clinical and clinical results referenced in this release may
not be indicative of results achievable in other trials or for
other indications, that the studies or trials may not be successful
or achieve the results desired, including safety and efficacy for
VGX-3100 and INO-3112, that pre-clinical studies and clinical
trials may not commence or be completed in the time periods
anticipated, that results from one study may not necessarily be
reflected or supported by the results of other similar studies and
that results from an animal study may not be indicative of results
achievable in human studies), the availability of funding to
support continuing research and studies in an effort to prove
safety and efficacy of electroporation technology as a delivery
mechanism or develop viable DNA vaccines, our ability to support
our broad pipeline of SynCon® active immune therapy and vaccine
products, our ability to advance our portfolio of immune-oncology
products independently, the ability of our collaborators to attain
development and commercial milestones for products we license and
product sales that will enable us to receive future payments and
royalties, the adequacy of our capital resources, the availability
or potential availability of alternative therapies or treatments
for the conditions targeted by the company or its collaborators,
including alternatives that may be more efficacious or
cost-effective than any therapy or treatment that the company and
its collaborators hope to develop, our ability to enter into
partnerships in conjunction with our research and development
programs, evaluation of potential opportunities, issues involving
product liability, issues involving patents and whether they or
licenses to them will provide the company with meaningful
protection from others using the covered technologies, whether such
proprietary rights are enforceable or defensible or infringe or
allegedly infringe on rights of others or can withstand claims of
invalidity and whether the company can finance or devote other
significant resources that may be necessary to prosecute, protect
or defend them, the level of corporate expenditures, assessments of
the company's technology by potential corporate or other partners
or collaborators, capital market conditions, the impact of
government healthcare proposals and other factors set forth in our
Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2014,
our Form 10-Q for the quarter ended September 30, 2015, and other
regulatory filings from time to time. There can be no assurance
that any product in Inovio's pipeline will be successfully
developed or manufactured, that final results of clinical studies
will be supportive of regulatory approvals required to market
licensed products, or that any of the forward-looking information
provided herein will be proven accurate.
CONTACTS:
Investors: Bernie Hertel, Inovio Pharmaceuticals, 858-410-3101, bhertel@inovio.com
Media: Jeff Richardson, Inovio Pharmaceuticals, 267-440-4211, jrichardson@inovio.com
Inovio Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:INO)
Historical Stock Chart
From Mar 2024 to Apr 2024
Inovio Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:INO)
Historical Stock Chart
From Apr 2023 to Apr 2024