Humanigen Elects Dr. Dale Chappell to Board of Directors
Humanigen, Inc. (NASDAQ:HGEN) appointed Dr. Dale Chappell as a director of the Company effective February 5, 2021. He retains his role as chief scientific officer, enhancing the board with his expertise. Dr. Chappell brings significant experience in tumor immunology and cytokine storm research, particularly relevant for the ongoing development of lenzilumab for COVID-19 treatment. CEO Cameron Durrant praised Dr. Chappell's contributions to the company’s success. Humanigen focuses on therapies targeting cancers and infectious diseases, including COVID-19.
- Appointment of Dr. Dale Chappell is expected to strengthen board governance.
- Dr. Chappell's expertise in immunology and drug development could lead to enhanced strategic decisions.
- Potential concerns regarding board effectiveness due to lack of diverse perspectives.
- Dr. Chappell's dual role may raise questions about focus and prioritization within the company.
Humanigen, Inc. (NASDAQ:HGEN) (“Humanigen”), a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company focused on preventing and treating an immune hyper-response called cytokine storm with its lead drug candidate lenzilumab™, today announced that the Company’s Board of Directors (the “Board”) has elected Dr. Dale Chappell, the Company’s chief scientific officer, to serve as a director of the Company, effective February 5, 2021. Dr. Chappell will continue to serve as the Company’s chief scientific officer.
“It has been an exciting time to participate in the development and execution of Humanigen’s business strategy,” stated Dr. Chappell. “I look forward to extending my contributions to further increase value as a member of the board. Humanigen has shown the strength of its research and development capabilities with the encouraging progress of lenzilumab for COVID-19—one of the most competitive areas of all of biopharma—and intends to get this drug to patients as quickly as possible following receipt of the requisite regulatory approvals.”
Commenting on Dr. Chappell’s appointment, Cameron Durrant, MD, MBA, chief executive officer of Humanigen said, “Having come to Humanigen as an investor and scientist, Dale has long been instrumental in helping shape our organization. His valuable service to the company has been evident in the successes we have seen over several years and more recently in our program for lenzilumab for COVID-19.”
Dr. Chappell joined Humanigen in July 2020 as full-time chief scientific officer after serving in an interim capacity for the Company. He began his career as a Howard Hughes Medical Institute fellow at the National Cancer Institute where he studied tumor immunology and published in the field of T-cell therapy, immunology pathways, and granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (“GM-CSF”), an immune system protein that initiates the cytokine storm that can occur in COVID-19. Dr. Chappell is also the founder of Black Horse Capital with decades of biotechnology investment experience.
About Humanigen, Inc.
Humanigen, Inc. is developing its portfolio of clinical and pre-clinical therapies for the treatment of cancers and infectious diseases via its novel, cutting-edge GM-CSF neutralization and gene-knockout platforms. Humanigen believes that its GM-CSF neutralization and gene-editing platform technologies have the potential to reduce the inflammatory cascade associated with coronavirus infection. Humanigen’s immediate focus is to prevent or minimize the cytokine release syndrome that precedes severe lung dysfunction and ARDS in serious cases of SARS-CoV-2 infection. Humanigen is also focused on creating next-generation combinatory gene-edited CAR-T therapies using strategies to improve efficacy while employing GM-CSF gene knockout technologies to control toxicity. In addition, Humanigen is developing its own portfolio of proprietary first-in-class EphA3-CAR-T for various solid cancers and EMR1-CAR-T for various eosinophilic disorders. Humanigen is also exploring the effectiveness of its GM-CSF neutralization technologies (either through the use of lenzilumab as a neutralizing antibody or through GM-CSF gene knockout) in combination with other CAR-T, bispecific or natural killer (NK) T cell engaging immunotherapy treatments to break the efficacy/toxicity linkage, including to prevent and/or treat graft-versus-host disease (GvHD) in patients undergoing allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT). Additionally, Humanigen and Kite, a Gilead Company, are evaluating lenzilumab in combination with Yescarta® (axicabtagene ciloleucel) in patients with relapsed or refractory large B-cell lymphoma in a clinical collaboration. For more information, visit www.humanigen.com and follow Humanigen on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook.
Humanigen Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements reflect management's current knowledge, assumptions, judgment and expectations regarding future performance or events. Although Humanigen management believes that the expectations reflected in such statements are reasonable, they give no assurance that such expectations will prove to be correct and you should be aware that actual events or results may differ materially from those contained in the forward-looking statements. Words such as "will," "expect," "intend," "plan," "potential," "possible," "goals," "accelerate," "continue," and similar expressions identify forward-looking statements, including, without limitation, statements regarding the use of lenzilumab to treat patients hospitalized with COVID-19, Humanigen’s expectations regarding the timeline to file for emergency use authorization (EUA), as well as a potential Biologics License Application (BLA) filing, statements regarding the timeline for delivery of lenzilumab to patients following receipt of the requisite regulatory approvals, and statements regarding Humanigen’s beliefs relating to lenzilumab and any of the other technologies in Humanigen’s current pipeline. These forward-looking statements are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties including, but not limited to, the risks inherent in Humanigen’s lack of profitability and need for additional capital to grow Humanigen’s business; Humanigen’s dependence on partners to further the development of Humanigen’s product candidates; the uncertainties inherent in the development, attainment of the requisite regulatory approvals or authorization for emergency or broader patient use for the product candidate and launch of any new pharmaceutical product; the outcome of pending or future litigation; and the various risks and uncertainties described in the "Risk Factors" sections and elsewhere in the Humanigen's periodic and other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
All forward-looking statements are expressly qualified in their entirety by this cautionary notice. You should not place undue reliance on any forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this release. Humanigen undertakes no obligation to revise or update any forward-looking statements made in this press release to reflect events or circumstances after the date hereof or to reflect new information or the occurrence of unanticipated events, except as required by law.
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