PharmaTelevision - Xanthus: Evolving Business Strategies

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Video title: Xanthus: Evolving Business Strategies

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Fintan Walton talks to Mike Boss, Chief Business Officer, Xanthus Pharmaceuticals, about his role in the evolution of Xanthus, a biopharmaceutical company founded in 2001. After covering Mike's industry experience, Fintan and Mike discuss how Xanthus morphed from a personalised medicine company into a drug discovery firm, which today has five promising molecules in its product pipeline. All of the company's products are focused on the treatment of cancer and autoimmune disorders. With successful backing from a group of venture capital firms and US$25 M secured in a recent funding round, Xanthus is in a strong position. Although the firm's business strategy was originally to in-license small novel molecules and advance them to a stage where partnering can be assessed, the acquisition of new molecules has led the firm to adapt this strategy according to the stage of the product in development. For one of Xanthus' molecules, this will involve taking the product through clinical trials.

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Michael Boss's experience in biotech industry.

Fintan Walton:

Welcome to PharmaVentures Business Review from San Francisco. On this show I have Michael Boss, Chief Business Officer at Xanthus Pharmaceuticals based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Welcome to the show.

Michael Boss:

Thank you Fintan Walton.

Fintan Walton:

Michael Boss, your name is synonyms with antibodies because you are the boss in the 00.00.26 patents. That I say that because it tells you a little bit about your history and your experience because you're originally joined the industry working on antibodies at Celltech and you are involved in obviously in the development of the capability to produce recombinant antibodies which is an important milestone, do you now you are involved in Xanthus Pharmaceuticals over those years you've had considerable amount of experience and at one stage you worked at Celltech then you moved over here to the US and you are involved in the area of diagnostics, want to tell us a little bit about that story.

Michael Boss:

There was a company original company was Genica Pharmaceuticals which was founded in 1990 as a clinical reference lab. The idea was the gene whose defect causes Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy was identified and the thought was to create a company that would do a diagnostic test on every male because it's an excellent disease that'll be a great business and it started the idea of having a specialized reference lab with proprietary technology and if you could get $750 times 2 million babies very nice business however the reality was that people did not want to do a muscle biopsy on their new born child [ph] and as they thought there was a problem.

Fintan Walton:

So that was when you are at Genica?

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Fintan Walton

Dr Fintan Walton is the Founder and CEO of PharmaVentures . After completing his doctoral research on the genetics of cell proliferation at the University of Michigan(US)and Trinity College (Dublin, Ireland), Dr Walton gained broad commercial experience in biotechnology in management positions at Bass and Celltech plc (1982-1992).

Michael Boss

Chief Business Officer

Michael Boss has 25 years experience in the biotechnology industry and is well known for his leading role on the first patent for recombinant antibodies (the "Boss Patent"). Since his role at Celltech, Michael Boss's career has flourished. After co-founding Oros Instruments, a firm that developed and manufactured protein purification equipment in 1987, he joined Genica Pharmaceuticals in 1991, first as Vice President of Research and Development, and later in 1997, was named Vice President of Operations. Following his time at Genica, he held the position of Vice President at Elan. Michael Boss graduated from the University of London with a BSc and PhD in immunology and an MBA from the London Business School. He completed his postdoctoral fellowship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) with Nobel Laureate Dr David Baltimore.

PharmaVentures

PharmaVentures is a corporate finance and transactions advisory firm that has served hundreds of clients worldwide in relation to their strategic deal making in the pharmaceutical, life science and healthcare sectors. Our key offerings include: Transactions / deal negotiations; Product / technology valuations; Deal term advice; Due diligence & expert reports; Strategy formulation; Alliance management; and Expert opinion for litigation/arbitration cases. PharmaVentures provides the global expertise to ensure our clients generate the highest possible return on investment from all their deal making activities. We have experience of all therapeutic areas and can offer advice on both product and technology commercialisation.

Xanthus Pharmaceuticals

Xanthus Pharmaceuticals , Inc. operates as a biopharmaceutical company. It focuses on the discovery, development, acquisition, and commercialization of small-molecule therapeutics for the treatment of cancer and autoimmune disorders. The company's portfolio of drugs includes Xanafide, a small moleculeoncology compound for the treatment of secondary acute myeloid leukemia; Symadex, an FLT3-Inhibitor compound for women with metastatic breast cancer; Oral Fludarabine for chronic lymphocytic leukemia; P2045 for non small cell lung cancers; and Clomet for solid tumors. It has a facility in Montreal,Canada. The company was founded as Xanthus Life Sciences Inc in 2001 and changed its name to Xanthus Pharmaceuticals , Inc. in 2006. Xanthus Pharmaceuticals , Inc. is headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts.