Inhibrx Biosciences, Inc. (Nasdaq: INBX), a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company with two programs in clinical-stage development, today announced the departure of Dr. Brendan Eckelman, co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer (CSO) and the appointments of Dr. Carlos Bais and David Matly to CSO and President, respectively.
Dr. Eckelman leaves the Company to establish a newly-formed private biotechnology company, where he will be founder and Chief Executive Officer. Inhibrx and the new company have entered into an exclusive license agreement for the rights to certain technologies no longer being pursued by Inhibrx. The agreement includes an upfront payment upon completion of the initial funding of Dr. Eckelman's new company and other future development milestones.
"I would like to express my deep gratitude to Brendan for his extraordinary contributions to Inhibrx over the last 15 years," said Mark Lappe, CEO of Inhibrx. "Brendan has had a profound impact on Inhibrx and we expect he will lead this next endeavor to the same success."
"I am immensely proud of the achievements and groundbreaking innovations we have developed since co-founding Inhibrx in 2010. As I announce my departure, it is a bittersweet moment.," says Dr. Eckelman. "I have the utmost confidence in the team and the culture of innovation I'm leaving behind and look forward to continuing to support Inhibrx in my capacity as a shareholder."
Dr. Carlos Bais, the Company's current Executive Vice President of Translational Sciences, will be appointed to CSO following Dr. Eckelman's departure.
Additionally, the Company also announced the promotion of David Matly to President in addition to his existing roles as Chief Commercial and Business Development Officer. In David's new role as President, he will continue to lead the commercial and business development functions as well as oversee clinical development and operations, R&D, technical operations and regulatory affairs. Notably, David played a key leadership role in Inhibrx, Inc.'s asset sale of INBRX-101 to Sanofi for up to $2.2B in 2024.
"We believe we are exceptionally well-positioned for continued success as Carlos steps into the role of CSO and David into the role of President," continued Mr. Lappe. "Carlos's strong scientific background and expertise in late-stage development make him a perfect candidate to assume the CSO role. And David's cross-functional understanding of successfully delivering best-in-class new therapies, combined with his ambition and commitment to the Company will prove to be pivotal to our future success. Each will play a crucial role as we continue to execute on our clinical programs in an effort to deliver significant impact to patients while maximizing the value to our shareholders."
About Dr. Bais
Dr. Bais began his career in the biopharmaceutical industry as a research lab head at Genentech and then as a Senior Director and Principal Scientist in the oncology biomarker development department. Later he served as a Director of Translational Medicine for cancer immunotherapy at Medimmune/Astrazeneca, and most recently prior to Inhibrx, as a Senior Director and Principal Scientist in the oncology biomarker development department at Genentech/Roche. Throughout his career, Dr. Bais led impactful research and translational strategies for multiple late-stage programs that resulted in high impact publications and drug approvals in diagnostic-positive patient subpopulations. Some of the drugs Dr. Bais and his team supported included Astrazeneca's Durvalumab (anti-PD-L1) and Tremelimumab (anti-CTLA-4), and Roche's Atezoluzimab (anti-PD-L1), Tiragolumab (anti-Tigit), and Bevacizumab (Avastin, anti-VEGF); he also oversaw biomarker support for early-stage drug candidate development, including T-cell engagers and therapies, along with individualized neoantigen cancer vaccines.
About Mr. Matly
Mr. Matly joined Inhibrx, Inc. in October 2021 from Novartis, where he most recently served as the global Vice President of the MDS/AML franchise. In this role, he was responsible for the launch preparation of their flagship program and building the MDS/AML portfolio, including the evaluation of in-licensing and M&A opportunities. Prior to this role, Mr. Matly was Novartis Oncology's global commercial lead of the sickle cell disease therapeutic area, leading the launch of ADAKVEO, and also serving as the global commercial lead of PROMACTA/REVOLADE. Prior to Novartis, Mr. Matly was the VP of Business Development at Chrono Therapeutics, a private venture capital-backed company. Mr. Matly began his career at Eli Lilly, holding several positions of increasing responsibility in sales and marketing, most notably leading the US launch of CYRAMZA in metastatic lung cancer.
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