Anticancer Bioscience (ACB) has named Hong Liu as vice president of clinical development. Liu joins ACB from Eureka Therapeutics, where he took multiple drug candidates from discovery to IND filing in his role as VP of R&D.
ACB is commercializing discoveries from the J. Michael Bishop Institute of Cancer Research. With a clutch of programs at stages ranging from discovery to preclinical studies, ACB has hired Liu as part of its preparations for becoming a clinical-stage biotech. The new hire will lead the development of ACB’s clinical strategy.
Liu landed the role after a spell at Eureka, a developer of T-cell therapies that is partnered with Lyell Immunopharma. Having helped Eureka get multiple solid tumor and hematological malignancy drugs into the clinic, Liu attracted the attention of ACB.
“As a highly experienced R&D leader in the field of oncology drug development, Dr. Liu will be a great addition to our world-class team as we progress our pipeline of assets, focused on synthetic lethality approaches. His appointment supports our ongoing mission to grow ACB into a leading international precision oncology company,” ACB CEO Dun Yang said in a statement.
ACB will give Liu responsibility for preparing data packages and IND filings with the FDA. The plan is to take at least one of the five programs in development at ACB into the clinic in the U.S. next year.
Liu will be based in San Francisco and the Chinese city of Chengdu. From its base in Chengdu, ACB has built a team of 50 people across sites in China, India, the U.K. and the U.S. ACB is expanding the team as it takes its programs toward the clinic.
Progress to date has been supported by the around $21 million in seed financing ACB raised to fund its discovery research. With clinical development on the horizon, ACB is now pursuing a series A round to support the next stage of its evolution.