Precision BioSciences, Inc. (Nasdaq: DTIL), a clinical stage biotechnology company developing allogeneic CAR T and in vivo gene correction therapies with its ARCUS® genome editing platform, today announced that Stanley R. Frankel, M.D. has been appointed as a Director on the Company’s Board of Directors and a member of the Board’s Science and Technology (S&T) Committee. Dr. Frankel is a hematologist-oncologist with extensive academic and industry experience in the research, clinical development, and commercialization of immuno-oncology and cellular therapies. He has led clinical development programs for multiple FDA-approved drugs to treat hematologic malignancies including acute lymphoblastic leukemia, multiple myeloma, and lymphoma.
“We are very pleased to welcome Stan to our Board of Directors and our S&T Committee,” said Kevin Buehler, Chairman of the Board of Directors at Precision BioSciences. “He has the full breadth of both academic and industry drug development experience, encompassing clinical development, regulatory expertise, CMC and quality impact as well as commercialization. Stan has helped to guide the most recently approved cellular therapies, and his experience will be critical to the next stage of drug development at Precision, helping us achieve our goal of taking our early success in the clinic through regulatory approval and commercial roll out.”
Dr. Frankel was most recently the Senior Vice President, Cellular Therapy Development at Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS) where he was responsible for late development portfolio of cellular therapy assets including Breyanzi® (lisocabtagene maraleucel) and Abecma® (idecabtagene vicleucel). While at BMS, he sat on multiple leadership teams and committees, including the Global Drug Development Leadership Team and the Cell Therapy Commercial Steering Committee. Prior to the BMS acquisition of Celgene, he was Corporate Vice President, Head, Immuno-Oncology & Cellular Therapy, Clinical Research and Development Head, Cell Therapy Clinical Center of Excellence at Celgene. While at Celgene he co-chaired the Hematology-Oncology Development Committee and served on the Hematology-Oncology Franchise Leadership Team. He served on Joint Steering and/or Joint Development Committees for alliances with JW Therapeutics, Jounce Therapeutics, Astra-Zeneca/Medimmune, Juno Therapeutics, and BeiGene.
Dr. Frankel received a B.A. in Applied Sciences, Biomechanics from Harvard College and an M.D. from Northwestern University, and has been a board-certified licensed physician since 1986. He completed his residency in internal medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital and his fellowship in hematology-oncology at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center where he was Chief Fellow. He has prior academic and clinical appointments at Roswell Park Cancer Institute, Georgetown University, and the University of Maryland prior to joining Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons as Adjunct Associate Professor of Medicine in the Division of Hematology/Oncology.
“I’m incredibly excited to join the Board of Directors at Precision BioSciences and look forward to working with their talented management team as they deploy their novel and well-differentiated ARCUS genome editing platform to develop potentially breakthrough allogeneic CAR T cell and gene correction therapies,” said Dr. Frankel.
Additionally, Tony Yao M.D., Ph.D, a member of Precision’s Board of Directors will continue to serve until his term concludes at the upcoming 2021 stockholders meeting on May 10, 2021. Dr. Yao has served on Precision’s Board, including its Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee, since April 2018. Dr. Yao also chaired the S&T Committee since it was formed in 2020.
“During Tony’s time on the board, Precision successfully transitioned from a private, early-stage start-up to a publicly traded, clinical stage, biotech company with a robust pipeline of allogenic CAR T candidates and several rare and infectious disease gene correction programs. We thank Tony for his contributions and wish him the best in his future endeavors,” added Mr. Buehler.
