CAMBRIDGE, United Kingdom, Nov. 13, 2024 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Mestag Therapeutics ("Mestag”), a biotech company harnessing new insights into fibroblast-immune interactions, today announced that it has expanded its leadership team with the appointments of Jan Endell, PhD, as Senior Vice President (SVP), Head of Development, and Alison Hood as General Counsel.

"I am thrilled to welcome Jan and Alison to Mestag's leadership team,” said Susan Hill, PhD, Chief Executive Officer of Mestag. "As we approach our first clinical trial initiation, Jan's experience across all stages of preclinical and early clinical development, together with Alison's global leadership experience and extensive legal expertise, will further empower team Mestag to progress our impactful new antibody therapies to patients as efficiently as possible.”

Jan Endell, PhD, SVP, Head of Development, noted, "Mestag is leading the way in the highly innovative area of fibroblast immunology. With MST-0300 poised to enter the clinic to induce TLS in solid tumors and M402 following closely behind in inflammatory diseases, I'm excited to be joining Mestag at a such a consequential stage in the development of its leading-edge therapies.”

Alison Hood, General Counsel, remarked, "I am delighted to be joining Mestag during this period of significant momentum. Mestag has a promising pipeline of drug candidates and the RAFT platform fuelling new opportunities for internal development and external collaborations. I look forward to working with the Mestag team towards our mission of delivering impactful therapeutics to patients with inflammatory diseases and cancer.”   

Jan Endell, PhD, Senior Vice President, Head of Development

Dr. Endell brings over 15 years of expertise in drug development and strategic leadership with a successful track record in advancing drugs from early stages to clinical development and commercialization. Throughout his career, he has held key positions in private and public biotech companies, with a particular expertise in cancer and autoimmune disease drug development.

Before joining Mestag, Dr. Endell served as Chief Scientific Officer (CSO) at Veraxa Biotech, where he led Veraxa's transformation into a development company. During his tenure, he also drove the conceptualization of the discovery strategy for complex ADC and CD3 bispecifics approaches. Previously serving as Vice President of Preclinical Development at Affimed, Jan oversaw non-clinical development and discovery programs of CD16A engagers, including concepts for multispecifics platforms combining different agonist biologies. During his preceding 12-year tenure at Morphosys, most recently leading clinical biomarkers and companion diagnostics, he supported the company's transition into a commercial stage company, driving preclinical development and translational science for antibody-based programs in oncology and autoimmune diseases across all development phases. Notably, he led the translational and pharmacology efforts for the anti-CD19 antibody tafasitamab (MONJUVI^®), contributing to its approval in the U.S. and Europe.

Dr. Endell obtained a PhD from LMU Munich, where he specialized in viral gene therapy aimed at addressing pre-existing immunity to adeno-associated viral vectors, and his undergraduate degree in Chemistry and Biochemistry from the University of Münster.

Alison Hood, General Counsel

Ms. Hood is an experienced general counsel in the biotech and pharma sector. She was previously VP & Head of Legal, International at Aimmune Therapeutics, a position she retained following the acquisition of Aimmune by Nestlé Health Science in 2020. With responsibility for all legal activities outside the U.S. and a member of the executive team, Ms. Hood led the legal function supporting the clinical, regulatory and commercial teams through approval and launch of Palforzia^® across Europe, and the expansion of the business from its original UK base to include offices in Ireland, Germany, France, and Switzerland. After Aimmune became a Nestlé Health Science company, Ms. Hood led legal operations in Europe and was closely involved in the integration of Aimmune into Nestle.

Prior to this, Ms. Hood was General Counsel at Vernalis plc, and Associate General Counsel at Celltech plc where she was primary counsel for the R&D team. She also worked in private practice at Theodore Goddard and Freshfields as a solicitor specializing in IP and technology. She began her career as the Research Assistant to the Dean of Dentistry at Sydney University.

Ms. Hood holds a BSC Hons in Biochemistry from the University of London and an MSc in Intellectual Property from Queen Mary, University of London.

About Mestag Therapeutics

Mestag harnesses new insights into fibroblast immunology to develop impactful treatments for patients with cancer and inflammatory diseases. We are progressing a pipeline of sophisticated first-in-class antibodies designed to direct and drive the immune system using known and emerging fibroblast-immune biology for a distinctly differentiated class of therapeutics.

Our pipeline includes the bispecific antibody MST-0300, which leverages a new understanding of tertiary lymphoid structures (TLS) in solid tumors and their role in driving improved patient outcomes; the M402 program, targeting a stromal checkpoint to dampen down the activation of specific immune cell subsets in inflammatory disease; and earlier programs in discovery stage.

Separately, we are also identifying novel targets for future therapies through the application of our RAFT Platform. In 2024, we established a license and research collaboration with MSD (tradename of Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, N.J., USA) to identify novel targets for inflammatory diseases. In 2021, we entered into a target discovery collaboration with Johnson & Johnson Innovative Medicine.

Our founding investigators comprise global experts in inflammatory disease, cancer, computational biology and fibroblast biology from the University of Oxford, Brigham & Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School and Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. We are supported by leading life science investors SV Health Investors, Johnson & Johnson Innovation - JJDC, Inc., Forbion, GV (formerly Google Ventures) and Northpond Ventures.

Mestag is headquartered in Cambridge, UK, and in 2021 was recognized on the Fierce 15 list of innovative biotechnology companies.

For further information please visit our website www.mestagtherapeutics.com

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