SAN LEANDRO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Rainier Therapeutics, Inc., a privately held clinical stage drug development company, today announced the appointment of Gary Christianson, PE, as Chief Technical Officer.
Mr. Christianson brings more than 30 years of industry experience in commercial product development, technical operations and manufacturing at companies including Corixa, GlaxoSmithKline, Cascadian Therapeutics and Nohla Therapeutics.
“Gary’s breadth of industry experience in clinical and commercial manufacturing will be invaluable to Rainier as we advance vofatamab in the metastatic and non-metastatic bladder cancer setting,” said Scott Myers, Chairman and CEO of Rainier Therapeutics. “We are excited to welcome Gary to the Rainier team.”
Mr. Christianson most recently served as Chief Operating Officer at Nohla Therapeutics. Prior to that, he served as Chief Operating Officer at Cascadian Therapeutics since 2007. Cascadian Therapeutics was acquired by Seattle Genetics in March 2018. Prior to his role at Cascadian, Mr. Christianson served as the site director for GlaxoSmithKline’s Biologics Unit following its acquisition of Corixa Corp. From 1999 to 2005, Mr. Christianson held positions as vice president, technical operations and general manager overseeing manufacturing and commercial product development. Prior to Corixa, Mr. Christianson served for 12 years overseeing manufacturing and site operations at RIBI ImmunoChem Research, a biopharmaceutical company developing late-stage adjuvant technology. Mr. Christianson received a B.S. in mechanical engineering technology from Montana State University.
About Rainier Therapeutics
Rainier Therapeutics, Inc. is a privately-held, clinical stage biotechnology company developing a targeted biologic for the potential treatment of metastatic bladder cancer. The company’s antibody, vofatamab (formerly B-701) is focused specifically on the fibroblast growth factor receptor 3 (FGFR3), a known driver of bladder and other cancers. Vofatamab is the most advanced targeted antibody specific for FGFR3 known by Rainier Therapeutics to be in clinical development.
Vofatamab is currently being evaluated in two clinical trials: FIERCE-21 and FIERCE-22.
The Fierce 21 trial is evaluating vofatamab alone and in combination with docetaxel versus docetaxel alone to determine safety and efficacy in the treatment of patients with locally advanced or metastatic bladder cancer with FGFR3 mutant/fusion who have relapsed after, or are refractory to, at least one prior line of chemotherapy. For more on this trial, visit www.clinicaltrials.gov (NCT0240542).
The Fierce 22 trial is evaluating vofatamab in combination with pembrolizumab, an immune checkpoint inhibitor, to determine safety, tolerability and efficacy in the treatment of patients with locally advanced or metastatic bladder cancer, who have progressed following platinum-based chemotherapy and who have not received prior immune checkpoint inhibitor therapy. For more on this trial, visit www.clinicaltrials.gov (NCT03123055).
Rainier Therapeutics also plans to study vofatamab in non-muscle invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC) – the FIERCE-23 trial.
For more information, please visit www.rainierrx.com.
