The appointment follows in the wake of the successful completion of a phase I clinical trial of the company’s Chikungunya vaccine
Themis Bioscience, a company developing prophylactic vaccines against emerging tropical infectious diseases, has announced the appointment of two new leadership members, Dr Philippe Dro and Dr Christian Mandl.
Dro will join the board of directors while Mandl will be the chairman of the company’s scientific advisory board.
Welcoming his new colleagues, Dr Erich Tauber, CEO and Founder, Themis said, “Themis is heading towards exciting times with our lead project, a Chikungunya vaccine candidate entering clinical trials phase II this year. The combined industry and vaccine development expertise of Dr Dro and Dr Mandl creates a fantastic asset for the company during its growth and continued partnering efforts.”
Reportedly, in the last 20 years Dro initiated and executed several strategic transactions. Prior to its acquisition by GSK, he served at the vaccine developer GlycoVaxyn AG as CEO and member of the Supervisory Board. Before that, he was leading Endoart, a medtech company, in the position of CEO and Chairman of the board through a successful sale process of the company to Allergan. When Actelion acquired Axovan AG, he was acting CFO and Head of Business Development. Prior to that, he served at Novartis, SkyePharma and Antares Pharma in a number of responsible functions.
Mandl has served as head of Novartis Vaccines’ US research and as global head for all viral vaccine research projects. Reportedly, he directed a team of 300 scientists working on over 15 viral and bacterial vaccine pipeline projects and platform technologies. Prior to this he acted as deputy head of the department of virology at the Medical University of Vienna. He is an internationally renowned expert in flaviviruses and co-inventor on several patents related to the marketed vaccine for tick-born encephalitis.
EP News Bureau – Mumbai
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