HOLON, Israel, Feb. 15,
2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Compugen Ltd. (NASDAQ:
CGEN) (TASE: CGEN), a
clinical-stage cancer immunotherapy company and a pioneer in
computational target discovery, today announced the
appointment of Michelle Mahler,
M.D., as Chief Medical Officer, effective March 1, 2024. Michelle will succeed Henry Adewoye, M.D., who is leaving Compugen to
pursue other opportunities effective February 29, 2024, after 6 years with
Compugen.
"I am delighted that Michelle will join the management team as
Chief Medical Officer at a very exciting time for Compugen," said
Anat Cohen-Dayag, Ph.D., President,
and Chief Executive Officer of Compugen. "Michelle joined Compugen
in October 2023 as Vice President of
Clinical Development reporting to Henry and brings with her
outstanding and extensive clinical development experience gained
through leading positions at biotech and pharmaceutical companies.
Since joining, Michelle has been leading the preparation of the
COM503 Phase 1 study, our potential first in class anti-IL18
binding protein program, recently partnered with Gilead Sciences.
In addition, she has also taken an integral role in leading our
ongoing triple combination studies. Michelle will assume overall
responsibility for advancing the future development of COM701,
COM902 and COM503 as well as potential additional pipeline drug
candidates as they enter clinical development."
Dr. Cohen-Dayag added, "I also want to take the opportunity to
thank Henry for his major contributions to Compugen. Henry has been
instrumental in laying a solid foundation as Compugen transitioned
into a clinical stage company and advancing Compugen's clinical and
regulatory strategy. I wish Henry the best of luck in his next
endeavors."
"I am very excited and energized to be taking over from Henry,
to lead and work to swiftly advance Compugen's clinical development
strategy into its next phase," said Dr. Mahler. "There is a
significant unmet need for many patients non-responsive to current
cancer immunotherapies and no greater reward than being able to
have the opportunity to positively impact their lives with
Compugen's potential first in class immunotherapies."
"It has been a pleasure working with Anat and her management
team advancing novel immuno-oncology investigational therapies in
areas of high unmet medical need and collaborating with colleagues
and many external stakeholders including thought-leaders,
investigators, their staff and our scientific advisors," said Dr.
Adewoye. "I particularly want to
thank Anat for her inspiring leadership throughout the years
and I wish Compugen continuing success."
Michelle joined Compugen in October
2023 as Vice President of Clinical Development. Most
recently Michelle was the Chief Medical Officer of 1 E therapeutics
Ltd., a drug development company, creating a novel class
of programmable oligonucleotide therapeutics and Aummune
Therapeutics Ltd., a clinical stage company developing a
first-of-its-kind approach for individualized treatment of solid
tumors. Michelle was Vice President of Clinical Development at C4
Therapeutics, Inc., helping to build up the clinical development
group and leading the successful submission of two INDs and
initiation of Phase 1 studies. Prior to C4 Therapeutics, Michelle
worked in R&D for 9 years at Janssen (now Johnson &
Johnson). During her time there she gained experience in late-stage
clinical development, pediatric development and global medical
affairs while being a key member of the ibrutinib development team
and held positions of increasing responsibility. In addition,
Michelle supported key due diligence projects including the
acquisition of Momenta Pharmaceuticals, Inc., by Johnson &
Johnson. Prior to starting in industry in 2011, Michelle
trained at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and New York
Presbyterian Hospital/ Weill Cornell. She also spent time at
Columbia Presbyterian and Mount Sinai Medical Center in
New York. Michelle obtained her
medical degree from University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa and is a board-certified
pediatric hematologist and oncologist.
About Compugen
Compugen is a clinical-stage therapeutic discovery and
development company utilizing its broadly applicable predictive
computational discovery capabilities to identify new drug targets
and biological pathways for developing cancer
immunotherapies. Compugen has developed two proprietary
product candidates: COM701, a potential first-in-class anti-PVRIG
antibody and COM902, a potential best-in-class antibody
targeting TIGIT for the treatment of solid tumors. Compugen also
has a clinical stage partnered program, rilvegostomig (previously
AZD2936), a PD-1/TIGIT bispecific antibody where the TIGIT
component is derived from Compugen's clinical stage anti-TIGIT
antibody, COM902, in Phase 3 development by AstraZeneca through a
license agreement for the development of bispecific and
multispecific antibodies. In addition, Compugen's therapeutic
pipeline of early-stage immuno-oncology programs consists of
programs aiming to address various mechanisms of immune resistance,
of which the most advanced program, in IND enabling studies is
COM503, which is licensed to Gilead. COM503 is a potential
first-in-class, high affinity antibody which blocks the interaction
between IL-18 binding protein and IL-18, thereby freeing natural
IL-18 in the tumor microenvironment to inhibit cancer growth.
Compugen is headquartered in Israel, with offices in San Francisco, CA. Compugen's shares are
listed on Nasdaq and the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange under the
ticker symbol CGEN.
Company contact:
Yvonne Naughton, Ph.D.
Head of Investor Relations and Corporate Communications
Email: ir@cgen.com
Tel: +1 (628) 241-0071
Photo:
https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/2341088/Michelle_Mahler.jpg
View original content to download
multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/compugen-announces-appointment-of-michelle-mahler-md-as-chief-medical-officer-302062841.html
SOURCE Compugen Ltd.