NEW HAVEN, Conn., March 2, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Arvinas LLC, a biotechnology company creating a new class of oncology drugs based on protein degradation, announced the appointment of Angela Shen, M.D., M.B.A, as chief medical officer of the company. Dr. Shen brings extensive experience in clinical development, medical affairs, and business development to Arvinas, having led clinical programs in oncology in a variety of pharmaceutical settings.
“Angela has been at the cutting edge of drug development, in uncharted territories,” said Tim Shannon, M.D., general partner at Canaan Partners and chairman of Arvinas’ board of directors. “She brings a novel and fresh perspective to drug development. Arvinas is in the process of creating a new class of oncology drugs, and Angela’s unique expertise and clinical perspectives will help drive the vision we have of developing Arvinas’ innovative platform into a new clinical paradigm.”
Prior to joining Arvinas, Dr. Shen spent over six years with Novartis Oncology. As a global clinical program head, she helped launch the CTL019 (CART-19) Cell & Gene Therapy program and built a clinical and operations team from the ground up. As head of clinical evaluation for the Oncology Business Development group, she was extensively involved in licensing in new compounds to strengthen the Novartis Oncology pipeline, including CTL019. Previously, Dr. Shen was a clinical lead at Novartis for the development of new oncology assets including panobinostat (Farydak®) and inhibitors of the enzyme PI3-kinase. At Exelixis, Dr. Shen served as clinical lead for multiple drugs in early development, including cobimetinib (Cotellic), which was subsequently developed by Genentech and recently obtained FDA approval. At Johnson & Johnson, Dr. Shen held a medical affairs role supporting Velcade®, Doxil®, Yondelis®, and Procrit®.
Dr. Shen earned her Bachelor of Science degree at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and went on to receive her medical degree from Albany Medical College in New York. Her post-doctoral experience included general surgery residency at Staten Island University Hospital, North Shore-LIJ Health System. Dr. Shen obtained her Master of Business Administration, with a concentration in finance and management, from New York University.
“Angela has the unique combination of entrepreneurial drive as well as experience with design and execution of early and late stage clinical trials. She will help define a clinical strategic vision that will support the successful advancement of Arvinas’ clinical candidates,” said Manuel Litchman, M.D., president and CEO of Arvinas.
About Arvinas
Arvinas is a pharmaceutical company focused on developing new small molecules aimed at degrading disease-causing cellular proteins. We are translating these innovative protein degradation approaches into novel drugs for the treatment of cancer and other diseases. Many diseases are a result of “rogue,” uncontrolled proteins, whose absence could bring great clinical benefit to patients. To address these pathological intracellular proteins, Arvinas is developing a new drug paradigm based on the elimination of these proteins. Our innovative protein degradation technology uses small molecule drugs to “tag” specific proteins to be degraded by the ubiquitin/proteasome system (UPS), which is responsible for the normal turnover of most proteins within the cell.
Based on groundbreaking research conducted at Yale University by our Founder and Chief Scientific Advisor, Craig Crews, PhD, Arvinas has developed a platform technology to induce the loss of intracellular proteins: Proteolysis-Targeting Chimera (PROTAC). The ability of PROTAC-based drugs to induce protein degradation (instead of protein inhibition) offers the advantage of potentially targeting “undruggable” as well as “druggable” elements of the proteome. This greatly expands our ability to create drugs for many new, previously unapproachable targets. For more information, visit www.arvinas.com.
Arvinas Media Contact
Carolyn Hawley
619-849-5382
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SOURCE Arvinas
