BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Scorpion Therapeutics, Inc. (“Scorpion Therapeutics”), a pioneering oncology company redefining the frontier of precision medicine through its Precision Oncology 2.0 strategy, today announced the formation of its Clinical Scientific Advisory Board (“Clinical SAB”). The Clinical SAB will complement the deep expertise of Scorpion Therapeutics’ leadership team, academic founders, Board of Directors, and the previously announced Discovery SAB to support the company in advancing its portfolio of potentially first- or best-in-class product candidates for the treatment of cancer.
The members of Scorpion’s Clinical SAB include:
- Alexander Eggermont, M.D., Ph.D., Professor of Immunotherapy at University Medical Center Utrecht and Chief Scientific Officer of the Princess Máxima Center for Pediatric Oncology, Utrecht, the Netherlands, as well as Emeritus Professor of Oncology at Paris-Sud University and Emeritus Professor of Oncological Surgery at Erasmus University Rotterdam.
- Keith Flaherty, M.D., Director of Clinical Research at the Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center, Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and co-founder of Scorpion Therapeutics.
- Pasi A. Jänne, M.D, Ph.D., Director of the Lowe Center for Thoracic Oncology, Belfor Center for Applied Cancer Science and Chen-Huang Center for EGFR Mutant Lung Cancers at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute and Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School.
- Joyce O’Shaughnessy, M.D., Co-Chair of Breast Cancer Research and Chair of Breast Cancer Prevention Research at Baylor-Sammons Cancer Center and The US Oncology Network
- Josep Tabernero, M.D., Ph.D., Director of the Vall d´Hebron Institute of Oncology (VHIO), as well as Co-Director of VHIO’s Research Unit for Molecular Therapy of Cancer and Head of the Gastrointestinal and Endocrine Tumors Group, and Head of the Medical Oncology Department of the Vall d’Hebron University Hospital.
“We are excited to announce the formation of our Clinical SAB and to welcome these world-renown physician-scientists to the Scorpion team,” said Axel Hoos, M.D., Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer of Scorpion Therapeutics. “Each member is a pioneer in the clinical development of novel medicines that have had transformational impact for patients We look forward to their guidance and contributions as we advance our growing portfolio toward the clinic, with the ultimate goal of optimizing and delivering transformational next-generation precision medicines for larger populations of cancer patients.”
“As a whole, this group has devoted their careers to accelerating the development of personalized cancer medicines and will bring us many important insights as we work to advance our lead programs into the clinic,” said Dr. Michael Streit, M.D., Chief Medical Officer of Scorpion Therapeutics and Chairman of the company’s Clinical SAB. “It is an ideal time to establish this advisory board, on the heels of naming our second development candidate and as we are advancing two potentially best-in-class programs, STX-478, targeting mutant PI3Kα and STX-721, targeting mutant EGFR Exon 20, toward investigational new drug (IND) applications in 2023. We look forward to partnering with these esteemed advisors to help finalize our development plans and support our maturation into a clinical-stage company.”
Alexander Eggermont, M.D., Ph.D.
Dr. Eggermont is the Professor of Immunotherapy at University Medical Center Utrecht and the Chief Scientific Officer of the Princess Máxima Center for Pediatric Oncology. He previously served as the General Director of the Gustave Roussy Cancer Center Campus Grand Paris, where he developed Europe’s largest Phase 1-2 drug and immunotherapy development program. Dr. Eggermont is also an Emeritus Professor of Oncology at Paris-Sud University, Emeritus Professor of Oncological Surgery at Erasmus University Rotterdam and a Fellow of the National Institutes of Health’s National Cancer Institute (NIH-NCI). Dr. Eggermont has served as President of ECCO, President of the EORTC, was a member of the Board of Directors of ASCO, served on the Editorial Board of the Journal of Clinical Oncology, and is currently Editor-in-Chief of the European Journal of Cancer. He has published more than 900 peer-reviewed papers and his expertise has been acknowledged by many professional awards throughout his career.
Keith Flaherty, M.D.
Dr. Flaherty is Director of Clinical Research at the Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center and Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. As described in the more than 300 peer reviewed primary research reports he has authored or co-authored, Dr. Flaherty and his colleagues made several seminal observations that have defined the treatment of melanoma when they established the efficacy of BRAF, MEK and combined BRAF/MEK inhibition in patients with metastatic melanoma in a series of New England Journal of Medicine articles for which Dr. Flaherty was the first or senior author. He is the principal investigator of the NCI MATCH trial, the first NCI-sponsored trial assigning patients to targeted therapy independent of tumor type on the basis of DNA sequencing detection of oncogenes. Dr. Flaherty joined the NCI Board of Scientific Advisors in 2018 and AACR Board of Directors in 2019. He serves as editor-in-chief of Clinical Cancer Research. Dr. Flaherty co-founded Loxo Oncology in 2013 and served on the board of directors through the acquisition by Eli Lilly in 2019. He co-founded X4 Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: XFOR) and privately held Strata Oncology (2015), Apricity Oncology (2017), C-Reveal (2020). He serves on the boards of directors for Clovis Oncology, Checkmate Pharmaceuticals, Kinnate BioPharma and Scorpion Therapeutics.
Pasi A. Jänne, M.D., Ph.D.
Dr. Jänne is the director of the Lowe Center for Thoracic Oncology, the Director of the Belfer Center for Applied Cancer Science and the Director of the Chen-Huang Center for EGFR Mutant Lung Cancers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. His main research interests include studying the therapeutic relevance of oncogenic alterations in lung cancer. He was one of the co-discoverers of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) mutations and has led the development of therapeutic strategies for patients with EGFR mutant lung cancer. Dr. Jänne has received several awards for his research, including from Uniting Against Lung Cancer, American Lung Association, and the Bonnie J. Addario Lung Cancer Foundation. He is an elected member to the American Society of Clinical Investigation (2008), American Association of Physicians (2016), and the Finnish Academy of Science and Letters (2016). Dr. Jänne is the recipient of 2010 American Association of Cancer Research Richard and Hinda Rosenthal Memorial Award and a member of the 2010 AACR Team Science Award, American Cancer Research Clinical Research Professorship (2017), Waun Ki Hong Award for Outstanding Achievement in Translational and Clinical Cancer Research from the American Association for Cancer Research (2018), Translational Research Award from the European Society for Medical Oncology (2018), R35 - Outstanding Investigator Award from the National Cancer Institute (2018), and Science of Oncology Award from the American Society of Clinical Oncology (2020).
Joyce O’Shaughnessy, M.D.
Dr. O’Shaughnessy is Director of Breast Cancer Research at Baylor-Sammons Cancer Center and Chair of Breast Cancer Research for US Oncology. She is a Diplomate of the American Board of Internal Medicine with subspecialty certification in medical oncology. She received her M.D. from Yale University Medical School, and completed her internship and residency in internal medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital. She concluded a fellowship in medical oncology at the National Cancer Institute in 1987 and was a Senior Investigator there until 1995. Dr. O’Shaughnessy is the recipient of several awards including: Giants of Cancer Care: Community Outreach/Education Award; Baylor University Medical Center: Staff Chief’s award; Holy Cross College: Santae Crucis Award (Distinguished Alumni Award): Public Health Service Special Service: Development of the Consensus Statement on Cancer Drug Approval Endpoints Award; and the Yale Medical School: Francis Parker Award (Faculty Choice for Most Promising Clinician). She is a member of the American Association for Cancer Research and the American Society of Clinical Oncology. Dr. O’Shaugnessy is the Founder of The School of Breast Oncology.
Josep Tabernero, M.D., Ph.D.
Dr. Tabernero is currently the Head of the Medical Oncology Department at the Vall d’Hebron Barcelona Hospital Campus and Director of the Vall d’Hebron Institute of Oncology (VHIO). He also co-directs the VHIO´s Gastrointestinal and Endocrine Tumours Group and the Research Unit for Molecular Therapy of Cancer (UITM) and is Principal Investigator of several Phase 1 pharmacodynamic studies and translational projects with molecular targeted therapies, as well as Phase 2 and 3 studies with novel chemotherapeutics. His group aims at potentiating molecular therapies targeting specific oncoproteins and accelerating more effective personalized cancer medicines for patients displaying genetic lesions or pathway disregulation. One of his team´s main objectives is to establish novel predictive markers of response to anti-cancer therapies and identify markers of primary resistance (de novo) and secondary treatment. Dr. Tabernero serves on the Editorial Boards of various top tier journals including Annals of Oncology, ESMO Open, Cancer Discovery and Clinical Cancer Research. He has authored or co-authored approximately 550 peer-reviewed papers. He has served as President of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) during the 2018 – 2019 term. He is also member of the AACR and ASCO, and has been appointed as member of several Educational and Scientific Committees of ESMO, ASCO, AACR, AACR/NCI/EORTC, ASCO Gastrointestinal, and ESMO-GI/WCGIC meetings.
About Scorpion Therapeutics
Scorpion Therapeutics is a pioneering oncology company redefining the frontier of precision medicine to deliver optimized and transformational therapies for larger populations of patients with cancer, a strategy Scorpion Therapeutics refers to as Precision Oncology 2.0. Scorpion Therapeutics has built a proprietary and fully integrated platform of the most advanced technologies across cancer biology, medicinal chemistry, and data sciences, with the goal of consistently and rapidly creating exquisitely selective small molecule compounds against an unprecedented spectrum of targets. Scorpion Therapeutics aims to leverage its platform to advance a broad pipeline of wholly owned, optimized compounds across three target categories: best-in-class molecules targeting validated oncogene targets; first-in-class molecules for previously undruggable targets; and first-in-class molecules for novel cancer targets. For more information, visit www.scorpiontx.com.
