MONTREAL--(BUSINESS WIRE)--SemaThera Inc., announces today that its board of directors has appointed Garth Cumberlidge as President and Chief Executive Officer. Dr. Cumberlidge was also elected to the board of directors of SemaThera. He will lead the company’s development programs in diabetic macular edema and other degenerative retinopathies. Its lead compound, ST-102, is a bispecific recombinant protein trap, binding both VEGF and SEMA3A.
“AmorChem is proud to welcome Garth Cumberlidge to the SemaThera team. Since its creation, the Company has generated very strong preclinical data and has already secured Senju Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. as development partner in Japan and China. Garth’s extensive background in ophthalmology drug development, fundraising expertise and experience in nurturing early-stage assets is a perfect match for SemaThera’s needs. Moreover, Maxime Ranger, general partner at AmorChem, who was interim CEO of SemaThera, will continue to serve as Chairman adding his extensive early-stage development expertise to the company,” said Elizabeth Douville, co-founder and managing partner at AmorChem.
“I am excited to have been given the opportunity to lead SemaThera and am extremely impressed with the quality of the decade-long scientific research work that forms the foundation of the company,” said Garth Cumberlidge. “Professor Mike (Przemyslaw) Sapieha and his co-workers have made some very significant discoveries that have led to the understanding of the function of semaphorins in general and semaphorin 3A in particular in both ocular and systemic pathologies and we are very fortunate to be able to continue to benefit from Mike’s scientific guidance, as Chief Scientific Officer, as we take the first lead compound into clinical studies.”
ABOUT SEMATHERA INC
SemaThera (www.semathera.com) is a Montreal-based biotech company focused on the development of novel anti-SEMA3A therapies for the treatment of several retinopathies, including diabetic macular edema and wet age-related macular degeneration. SemaThera holds exclusive rights to various SEMA3A based technologies, where semaphorin 3A is involved in neo-angiogenesis, senescence and neuronal regeneration. Such technologies may also become future therapies in cancer and neurodegenerative diseases.
