BERKELEY, Calif., April 24,
2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Actym Therapeutics, pioneering a
new drug modality to treat solid tumors, announced today the
appointment of Thomas Smart as Chief
Executive Officer. With 25 years of experience in senior management
and executive roles as well as Board of Directors positions across
the biopharmaceutical industry, Mr. Smart brings a significant
track record in leading organizations through value-building
transitions. His breadth of expertise will be highly beneficial to
Actym as it prepares to enter clinical evaluation of its lead
candidate, ACTM-838, later this year.
Actym's proprietary platform, S. Typhimurium-Attenuated
Cancer Therapy (STACT), represents a novel approach to achieving
comprehensive immunological reprogramming of the tumor
microenvironment. Mr. Smart's appointment follows Actym's recent
presentations of preclinical data at both the 2023 SITC and 2024
AACR Annual Meetings showcasing ACTM-838's ability to selectively
accumulate in the TME and locally deliver two potent payloads,
engineered IL-15 and engineered STING.
"Tom is an extremely valuable addition to Actym's leadership,
bringing extensive experience in corporate development and
strategic planning, coupled with a profound understanding of how to
translate innovative R&D into novel therapeutics. With Tom at
the helm, we are ready for our next stage of corporate growth as we
close in on the start of our Phase 1 clinical development program
for ACTM-838," said Julie
Cherrington, Ph.D., Executive Chair of the Actym Board of
Directors. "We extend our thanks to Chris
Thanos for his founding contributions to the company."
"Actym represents an exceptional opportunity to achieve a new
level of therapeutic impact across multiple tumor types. In
addition to moving ACTM-838 into the clinic in the second quarter,
our goal is to expand our pipeline with additional candidates from
Actym's modular platform. The STACT approach provides both efficacy
and safety advantages by leveraging a genetically modified bacteria
vehicle, systemically administered, that achieves tissue-specific
delivery of large nucleic acid payloads," said Thomas Smart, CEO of Actym. "I look forward to
collaborating with the Board of Directors and the entire Actym team
to maximize the potential of ACTM-838 and our platform."
Mr. Smart has a distinguished 25-year career as a biotech
executive, demonstrating dynamic leadership in roles such as CEO,
CBO, SVP, and Board Member. In addition, Mr. Smart has a
comprehensive background in therapeutic modalities ranging from
antibodies and small molecules to peptides, RNA, DNA, CAR-T, and
other cell therapies. Before joining Actym Therapeutics, Mr. Smart
founded Gravitas Therapeutics, where he served as CEO and Board
Chair and orchestrated the acquisition and subsequent sale of the
clinical-stage antifungal asset, GR-2397, to Basilea Pharmaceutica
Ltd (SIX: BSLN) in October 2023. His
prior leadership roles include serving as CEO and Board Chair of
AnaptysBio (NASDAQ: ANAB), Chief Business Officer of XOMA (NASDAQ:
XOMA), and various positions at Genetics Institute (now Pfizer),
GenVec (now Precigen; NASDAQ: PGEN), Searle (now Pfizer), and Cell
Genesys. Mr. Smart holds a Bachelor of Science degree from
Cornell University and earned his
Master of Business Administration from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.
About Actym
Actym Therapeutics has engineered a new drug modality harnessing
the power of a genetically modified bacterial vehicle that safely
introduces therapeutic payloads to activate the immune response in
the tumor microenvironment. To achieve targeted anti-tumor effects,
we have developed a systemically administered treatment that
exploits intrinsic TME-specific metabolites, enabling selective
enrichment of the bacterial vehicle in tumors. After cell-specific
entry, our lead candidate, ACTM-838, positively activates
tumor-resident myeloid cells and delivers two synergistic payloads,
optimized IL-15 and STING, unlocking a comprehensive and durable
innate and adaptive anti-tumor immune response. With the ability to
tailor our platform utilizing a range of payload combinations, we
aim to achieve a new level of therapeutic impact for cancer
patients across multiple tumor types.
Contacts
For Actym Therapeutics
Thomas E. Smart, CEO
E-Mail: info@actymthera.com
Media Requests for Actym
Dr. Alison Opalko or Sara
Ortiz
Trophic Communications
Phone: +49 151 54041130 or +49 160 90816161
E-Mail: actym@trophic.eu
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SOURCE Actym Therapeutics Inc.