Benzinga | Apr 1, 2021 08:03AM EDT

Vincerx Pharma Announces Formation Of Scientific Advisory Board To Advance Clinical Pipeline

Vincerx Pharma, Inc. (NASDAQ:VINC), a biopharmaceutical company aspiring to address the unmet medical needs of patients with cancer through paradigm-shifting therapeutics, today announced the formation of its Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) composed of world leading academics and industry leaders in cancer research and therapeutics. John C. Byrd, M.D., will serve as Chairman of the SAB.



"The Vincerx team is thrilled to welcome globally recognized key opinion leaders in hematologic malignancies and oncology drug development to our newly formed SAB," said Ahmed Hamdy M.D., Chief Executive Officer of Vincerx. "Their collective expertise aligns with the advancement of our diversified oncology pipeline and will be critical as we expand our research and development efforts and prepare to launch Phase 1b studies of VIP152, our highly selective and potent CDK9 inhibitor, in Myc-driven hematologic malignancies and solid tumors, as well as relapsed/refractory chronic lymphocytic leukemia."

"I am delighted to join Vincerx's SAB along with my esteemed colleagues," said John C. Byrd, M.D., Chairman of the Vincerx Scientific Advisory Board. "Vincerx has a compelling pipeline of potentially transformative oncology therapies and I look forward to working with this team of clinicians, translational researchers, clinical trial experts and oncology pioneers to guide the clinical development and strategy at Vincerx."

Vincerx's SAB is comprised of:

John C. Byrd, M.D. - Chairman

Dr. Byrd is an internationally known researcher and clinical specialist in leukemia and other hematologic malignancies at Ohio State's Comprehensive Cancer Center -- James Cancer Hospital and Solove Research Institute, where he serves as Senior Advisor for Cancer Experimental Therapeutics. He is a Distinguished University Professor of Medicine and Medicinal Chemistry and holds the D. Warren Brown Chair in Leukemia Research. Dr. Byrd is also the Chief Medical Officer for the Beat AML trial. Dr. Byrd received his medical degree from the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. His education continued in hematology and oncology at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and Johns Hopkins University before moving to Columbus to join the faculty at Ohio State.

Howard A. "Skip" Burris III, M.D., FASCO, FACP

Dr. Burris serves as President and Chief Medical Officer of Sarah Cannon, as well as the Executive Director, drug development for Sarah Cannon Research Institute. He is an associate of Tennessee Oncology, PLLC, where he practices medical oncology. Dr. Burris completed his undergraduate education at the United States Military Academy at West Point, his medical degree at the University of South Alabama, and his internal medicine residency and oncology fellowship at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio. He also served as the Director of Clinical Research at The Institute for Drug Development of the Cancer Therapy and Research Center and The University of Texas Health Science Center. He attained the rank of lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army, and among his decorations, he was awarded a Meritorious Service Medal with oak leaf cluster for his service in Operation Joint Endeavor.

Gerard Evan, Ph.D.

Dr. Evan is the Sir William Dunn Professor and Head of Biochemistry at the University of Cambridge. Prior to Cambridge, he was the Gerson and Barbara Bass Bakar Distinguished Professor of Cancer Research at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF). Earlier in his career, he was at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund Laboratories in London and elected to the Royal Society's Napier Research Professorship. Dr. Evan studied Biochemistry at Oxford, earned his Ph.D. at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, and completed post-doctoral studies in the laboratory of Mike Bishop at UCSF, followed by a return to Cambridge as a research fellow at Downing College. Dr. Evan was elected to EMBO in 1996, the UK Academy of Medical Sciences in 1999, the Royal Society in 2004, the European Academy of Sciences in 2006, the European Academy of Cancer Sciences in 2013, and the Academy of the American Association for Cancer Research in 2019.

Ian W. Flinn, M.D., Ph.D.

Dr. Flinn is an internationally recognized clinical investigator whose research focuses on the development of new therapies for patients with lymphoma and chronic lymphocytic leukemia. This research includes first in human to Phase 3 trials with novel approaches such as immune effector cell therapies, inhibitors of the B cell receptor pathway, and BCL-2 inhibitors amongst others. He is an author of approximately 200 articles in journals, such as the New England Journal of Medicine, Lancet, Journal of Clinical Oncology, and Blood. Dr. Flinn joined Tennessee Oncology and Sarah Cannon in 2006 and serves as Director of Lymphoma Research. In his role, he oversees lymphoma research throughout Sarah Cannon and its affiliates. Dr. Flinn also serves as the director for the Sarah Cannon Center for Blood Cancer at Tennessee Oncology.

Andre Goy, M.D., M.S.

Dr. Goy is an internationally renowned clinician and researcher of all types of lymphoma, including Hodgkin's disease, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma including aggressive lymphoma and mantle cell lymphoma, and HIV-associated lymphoma. As Physician in Chief for Hackensack Meridian Health Oncology Services and Chairman of John Theurer Cancer Center at Hackensack University Medical Center as well as Founding Chair of Oncology at the Hackensack Meridian Health School of Medicine, he leads New Jersey's largest program for research, treatment and management of lymphoma. He is also Professor of Medicine at Georgetown University in Washington, DC. Dr. Goy has trained and/or worked at some of the world's leading medical institutions, including Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, University Hospitals Group of Paris, and The Pasteur Institute.

Rosa Lapalombella, Ph.D.

Dr. Lapalombella, Assistant Professor at The Ohio State University, has a strong history of translational medical research. Dr. Lapalombella earned her Ph.D. from the University of Bologna, Italy, and subsequently focused on translational research for hematologic cancers, especially leukemia, and conducted her postdoctoral training in the laboratory of John Byrd, M.D. at The Ohio State University. Prior to her current appointment, she completed four years of post-doctoral training, followed by two-year appointments as a Research Scientist with PI status and then served as a Research Assistant Professor. Her two major areas of research interest are epigenetic alterations of cancer cells and development of experimental therapeutics for hematologic disease.

Anthony W. Tolcher, M.D., FRCPS(C), FACP

Dr. Tolcher is CEO and Founder of NEXT OncologyTM, San Antonio and Austin, Texas, a Phase I group that seeks to transform early clinical trials. Dr. Tolcher served as President and Co-Founder of START LLC from 2009-2018, one of the world's largest Clinical Phase I and early drug development operations in cancer medicine with 5 locations in San Antonio, Texas; Grand Rapids, Michigan; Madrid, Spain; and Shanghai, China. Dr. Tolcher is a medical oncologist who has over 25 years' experience in early drug development and clinical trials. He is currently the principal investigator on 40 Phase I clinical studies, is a reviewer for the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Clinical Cancer Research, and Annals of Oncology. He has chaired the Developmental Therapeutics Review Committee for the American Association of Clinical Oncology Annual Scientific Program.

About Vincerx Pharma, Inc.

Vincerx Pharma (Vincerx) is a recently formed clinical-stage life sciences company focused on leveraging its extensive development and oncology expertise to advance new therapies intended to address unmet medical needs for the treatment of cancer. Vincerx's executive team has assembled a management team of biopharmaceutical experts with extensive experience in building and operating organizations that develop and deliver innovative medicines to patients. Vincerx's current pipeline is derived from an exclusive license agreement with Bayer and includes a clinical-stage and follow-on small molecule drug program and a preclinical stage bioconjugation/next-generation antibody-drug conjugate platform. For more information, please visit www.vincerx.com.