Cytovia Therapeutics Appoints Luca Scavo as Chief Financial Officer and James Priour as Chief Product Officer

“In the past year, Cytovia has graduated into a fully-integrated global biotech with R&D and cell manufacturing capabilities. As we advance our product candidates towards clinical trials and prepare to become a public company, we have decided to further enhance our leadership team,” said Dr. Daniel Teper, CEO of Cytovia Therapeutics. “We welcome Luca and James to Cytovia. Their deep operational experience in both pharma and biotech will be key in driving the anticipated growth of the company.”

Mr. Scavo previously served as Chief Financial Officer (CFO) at Evelo Biosciences, Inc. (NASDAQ: EVLO). Prior to joining Evelo Biosciences, Mr. Scavo was the Senior Vice President and CFO of Roche Diagnostics North America. Prior to Roche Diagnostics, he held global leadership roles across the Roche organization for more than 20 years, including serving as Vice President, Chief Accounting Officer at Genentech, Inc. and CFO at Roche Latin America. Mr. Scavo also served as CFO at AstraZeneca, Spain and worked in a series of finance roles at Roche’s offices in Austria, New Jersey, and Switzerland. He holds a Certified Public Accountant (CPA) license in California, a Masters in Business Administration (MBA) from the Instituto de Empresa (Madrid-Spain), as well as a bachelor’s degree in Economics and Business from Universita’ Politecnica delle Marche (Italy).

“I am excited by the impact immuno-oncology and cell therapy have had on cancer patient outcomes,” said Mr. Scavo. “Cytovia’s technologies and pipeline offer promise by engaging and empowering natural killer (NK) cells as a novel therapeutic modality to address key unmet medical needs.”

Mr. Priour brings over 30 years of leadership experience in drug development, portfolio strategy, commercialization, strategic partnership and alliance management, including experience in the oncology therapeutic area. Since 2020, Mr. Priour served as Chief Commercial Officer at Zymeworks, Inc. (NYSE: ZYME), a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on developing multi-specific drugs for HER2 overexpressing solid tumors. Prior to joining Zymeworks, Mr. Priour was at Amgen Corporate Headquarters in Southern California and served as the Global Marketing Lead for Kyprolis® (medication approved in relapsed or refractory Multiple Myeloma). Shortly thereafter, he was appointed to Global Product General Manager for the entire Myeloma franchise. He also held leadership roles at Amgen France in 2009, where he served as Business Unit Head for General Medicine, and in 2012, he became the General Manager of Amgen Australia & New Zealand. He also served as General Manager of Hungary for Bristol Myers Squibb in 2006. Mr. Priour started his career in 1992 with Procter & Gamble Pharmaceuticals, where he held various commercial leadership positions based out of their France, Belgium, Luxemburg and Cincinnati, USA corporate offices. Mr. Priour holds an MBA from the NEOMA Business School.

“I am excited by Cytovia’s progress towards clinical trials,” said Mr. Priour. “The combination of iPSC-derived NK (or iNK) cells and Flex-NK™ cell engager multispecific antibodies is a key differentiator of our pipeline, which includes both novel targets such as GPC3 for hepatocellular carcinoma and established targets such as CD38 for multiple myeloma.”

About Cytovia Therapeutics

Cytovia Therapeutics is developing novel cell therapies and immunotherapies aimed at addressing solid and hematological tumors with significant unmet medical needs. Cytovia Therapeutics is focusing on harnessing the innate immune system by developing complementary and disruptive NK-cell and NK-engager antibody platforms. The company is developing three types of iPSC-derived (or iNK) cells: unedited iNK cells, TALEN® gene-edited iNK cells with improved function and persistence and TALEN® gene-edited iNK cells with chimeric antigen receptors (CAR-iNKs) to improve tumor-specific targeting. The second complementary cornerstone technology is a quadrivalent multifunctional antibody platform designed to engage natural killer cells by targeting NKp46 using Cytovia Therapeutics’s proprietary Flex-NK™ technology.

These two technology platforms are being used to develop treatments for patients with solid tumors such as hepatocellular carcinoma and glioblastoma as well as hematological malignancies such as refractory multiple myeloma.

Headquartered in Aventura, FL, Cytovia Therapeutics has research and development laboratories in Natick, MA, and a cell manufacturing facility in Puerto Rico. The company’s own R&D work is augmented through scientific partnerships with Cellectis, CytoImmune, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, INSERM, the New York Stem Cell Foundation and the University of California San Francisco (UCSF).

Cytovia Therapeutics has a strategic partnership with CytoLynx Therapeutics, which is focused on research and development, manufacturing and commercialization activities in Greater China and beyond.

As previously announced on April 26, 2022, Cytovia Therapeutics entered into a Merger Agreement and Plan of Reorganization with Isleworth Healthcare Acquisition Corp. (“Isleworth”), a publicly traded special purpose acquisition company, providing for a business combination that would result in Cytovia Therapeutics becoming a publicly traded company. The transaction is expected to close in the second half of 2022, subject to the satisfaction of customary closing conditions, including the approval of the shareholders of Cytovia Therapeutics and Isleworth.

Find out more at www.cytoviatx.com

Source: PR Newswire