Deciphera Pharmaceuticals Announces Retirement of Daniel L. Flynn, Ph.D., and Appointment of Dashyant Dhanak, Ph.D., as Executive Vice President and Chief Scientific Officer
August 03 2023 - 4:15PM
Business Wire
— Director Ron Squarer Appointed Chairperson of
the Board; James A. Bristol, Ph.D., continues as Board Member —
Deciphera Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: DCPH), a
biopharmaceutical company focused on discovering, developing, and
commercializing important new medicines to improve the lives of
people with cancer, today announced that the Company’s Founder,
Executive Vice President, and Chief Scientific Officer, Daniel L.
Flynn, Ph.D., will retire effective September 5, 2023 and will
transition to a role as Senior Advisor to the Company. Dashyant
Dhanak, Ph.D., has been appointed Executive Vice President and
Chief Scientific Officer effective September 5, 2023.
Dr. Dhanak brings over 30 years of experience in pharmaceutical
research and development and joins Deciphera from Incyte
Corporation where he was Executive Vice President and Chief
Scientific Officer.
“On behalf of all my colleagues, I want to thank Dan for his
vision to found Deciphera two decades ago as a company dedicated to
improving the lives of people with cancer. It has been an honor to
work alongside such a trailblazing researcher whose innovations in
drug discovery now benefit thousands of cancer patients around the
world and have the potential to continue making an impact for years
to come thanks to our rich clinical and pre-clinical pipeline
developed from the research engine that Dan created,” said Steve
Hoerter, President and Chief Executive Officer of Deciphera
Pharmaceuticals. “We are excited to build on our track record of
innovation in drug discovery with the announcement that Dash Dhanak
is joining Deciphera as our new Chief Scientific Officer. In
addition to broad experience in drug discovery and development,
Dash is a proven leader with a track record of advancing innovative
oncology agents to the clinic. I look forward to working with Dash
to continue to build a strong pipeline of novel therapies at
Deciphera.”
“I am unbelievably proud of Deciphera’s progress and
accomplishments in the years since I founded the company. We have
grown from a small research team into a fully-integrated
biotechnology company with capabilities from research to
international commercialization, anchored as always by a culture
that seeks to drive innovation to help patients as our first
priority. Together, we have improved the quality of life for many
cancer patients around the world,” said Dr. Flynn. “I am confident
that the Company’s discovery and early-stage programs are in
excellent hands with Dash, and under his leadership, I know
Deciphera will develop additional important new medicines for the
treatment of cancer.”
“It’s an honor to continue Dan’s legacy of innovation. I’m
thrilled to join Deciphera at this pivotal time as it prepares to
become a company with multiple approved medicines,” said Dr.
Dhanak. “As Deciphera continues to mature as a commercial company,
we remain driven to innovate and to discover new medicines to help
patients with cancer.”
Prior to Deciphera, Dr. Dhanak served as Chief Scientific
Officer and Executive Vice President at Incyte Corporation. Before
joining Incyte in 2018, Dr. Dhanak was Vice President and Head of
Discovery Sciences at Janssen Research & Development, and
previously spent 25 years at GlaxoSmithKline in positions of
increasing responsibility across multiple disease areas, including
his final role as Vice President and Head of the Cancer Epigenetics
Discovery Performance Unit. Dr. Dhanak received a B.Sc. in
Chemistry from the University of Manchester Institute of Science
and Technology and a Ph.D. from the University of London. He
completed his postdoctoral research in Natural Product Synthesis at
Northwestern University.
In addition, the Company announced today that Ron Squarer has
been appointed Chairperson of the Board of Directors. Mr. Squarer
has over 30 years of experience in the pharmaceutical and
biotechnology industry and joined Deciphera as a Director in
December 2019. Mr. Squarer served as Chief Executive Officer and a
member of the board of directors of Array BioPharma, Inc. from 2012
until its acquisition by Pfizer Inc. in August 2019 following the
successful commercial launches of both Braftovi® and Mektovi®.
James A. Bristol, Ph.D., who has served as either Chairperson or
Co-Chairperson since 2007, will remain a Board member of
Deciphera.
“I want to recognize Jim Bristol’s tremendous leadership as
Chairperson of the Deciphera board for over 15 years. Jim’s deep
industry expertise has been invaluable in guiding our research
activities, scaling our organization, and transforming Deciphera
into a leading commercial-stage oncology company. We thank him for
his exceptional stewardship as Chairperson and look forward to his
continued contributions as a member of the board,” said Mr.
Hoerter.
About Deciphera Pharmaceuticals
Deciphera is a biopharmaceutical company focused on discovering,
developing, and commercializing important new medicines to improve
the lives of people with cancer. We are leveraging our proprietary
switch-control kinase inhibitor platform and deep expertise in
kinase biology to develop a broad portfolio of innovative
medicines. In addition to advancing multiple product candidates
from our platform in clinical studies, QINLOCK® is Deciphera’s
switch-control inhibitor for the treatment of fourth-line GIST.
QINLOCK is approved in Australia, Canada, China, the European
Union, Hong Kong, Israel, Macau, New Zealand, Singapore,
Switzerland, Taiwan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. For
more information, visit www.deciphera.com and follow us on LinkedIn
and Twitter (@Deciphera).
Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains forward-looking statements within
the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of
1995, as amended, including, without limitation, the ability for
Deciphera to develop additional important new medicines for the
treatment of cancer and to become a company with multiple approved
medicines. The words “may,” “will,” “could,” “would,” “should,”
“expect,” “plan,” “anticipate,” “intend,” “believe,” “estimate,”
“predict,” “project,” “potential,” “continue,” “seek,” “target” and
similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking
statements, although not all forward-looking statements contain
these identifying words. Any forward-looking statements in this
press release are based on management’s current expectations and
beliefs and are subject to a number of risks, uncertainties and
important factors that may cause actual events or results to differ
materially from those expressed or implied by any forward-looking
statements contained in this press release, including, without
limitation, our ability to successfully demonstrate the efficacy
and safety of our drug or drug candidates, the preclinical or
clinical results for our product candidates, which may not support
further development of such product candidates, comments, feedback
and actions of regulatory agencies, our ability to commercialize
QINLOCK and execute on our marketing plans for any drugs or
indications that may be approved in the future, the inherent
uncertainty in estimates of patient populations, competition from
other products, our ability to obtain and maintain reimbursement
for any approved product and the extent to which patient assistance
programs are utilized and other risks identified in our Securities
and Exchange Commission (SEC) filings, including our Quarterly
Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended March 31, 2023, and
subsequent filings with the SEC. We caution you not to place undue
reliance on any forward-looking statements, which speak only as of
the date they are made. We disclaim any obligation to publicly
update or revise any such statements to reflect any change in
expectations or in events, conditions or circumstances on which any
such statements may be based, or that may affect the likelihood
that actual results will differ from those set forth in the
forward-looking statements.
The Deciphera logo and the QINLOCK® word mark and logo are
registered trademarks and the Deciphera word mark is a trademark of
Deciphera Pharmaceuticals, LLC.
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version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20230803652580/en/
Investor Relations: Maghan Meyers Argot Partners
Deciphera@argotpartners.com 212-600-1902
Media: David Rosen Argot Partners
david.rosen@argotpartners.com 212-600-1902
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