Rituximab/Hyaluronidase

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- KSQ, a biotechnology company using its proprietary CRISPRomics® discovery platform to systematically screen the whole genome to identify optimal gene targets for oncology and autoimmune disease, today announced it has appointed Qasim Rizvi as chief executive officer. Dr. Rizvi joins KSQ today as CEO and will also become a member of the company’s board of directors. Dr. Rizvi is a highly accomplished healthcare executive with broad experience in the biopharmaceuticals industry and was most recently senior vice president of operations and chief commercial officer at Kiniksa Pharmaceuticals. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: Qasim Rizvi, MB.ChB. (Photo: Business Wire) “Qasim is an accomplished leader with a distinguished track record of innovation and operational excellence, coupled with a strong commitment to collaboration and teambuilding. He joins KSQ at an important inflection point in the company’s strategic evolution, as we advance our expanding pipeline and prepare to transition to development stage,” said Theo Melas-Kyriazi, chair of the KSQ board of directors. “The board is confident that Qasim, along with the entire KSQ leadership team, will provide the expertise, vision and leadership required to advance KSQ’s ambitions to deliver breakthrough products for patients.” Dr. Rizvi commented, “This is an exciting time for the company. KSQ has created the most comprehensive capability to identify and validate novel targets in cancer cells and T cells. Its approach has broad implications across a range of oncology, immuno-oncology, and immune indications. The recently completed Takeda collaboration provides a world-class strategic partner for our immuno-oncology programs and validation for our truly groundbreaking CRISPR-based discovery platform. In addition, the company recently presented data on KSQ-4279 at the 32nd EORTC-NCI-AACR Symposium in October 2020, demonstrating the power of its approach. There is much work to be done. I am humbled and excited to serve as KSQ’s CEO, and I’m very much looking forward to diving in with the full team to deliver on the platform’s potential and positively impact the lives of patients.” Prior to joining KSQ, Dr. Rizvi was senior vice president of operations & chief commercial officer at Kiniksa Pharmaceuticals. He held previous positions at Genentech, where he most recently served as vice president and franchise head of Tecentriq®, with commercial responsibilities for Genentech’s cancer immunotherapy portfolio. Earlier, he led Roche’s hematology franchise, as VP of global product strategy and lifecycle leader for Hemlibra® for hemophilia A. Dr. Rizvi has a record of success in building exceptional teams that deliver results. He has extensive launch experience in the oncology space; having launched Herceptin®, Perjeta® and Kadcyla® for HER2-positive breast cancer as well as Venclexta® for chronic lymphocytic leukemia and Gazyva® for follicular lymphoma. Under his leadership, Rituxan Hycela® received FDA approval as the first sub-cutaneous treatment for non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Prior to joining Genentech, Dr. Rizvi was at Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly, where he served in numerous roles in sales, marketing, business development and new product planning. Dr. Rizvi earned an MB.ChB. from the University of Dundee Medical School in Scotland. He completed his residency in general surgery, including rotations in neurosurgery, orthopedics, ENT and accident and emergency care. He also holds an M.B.A. from the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan. About KSQ Therapeutics KSQ Therapeutics is advancing a pipeline of tumor- and immune-focused drug candidates for the treatment of cancer across multiple drug modalities including targeted therapies, adoptive cell therapies and immuno-therapies. KSQ’s proprietary CRISPRomics® discovery engine enables genome-scale, in vivo validated, unbiased drug discovery across broad therapeutic areas. KSQ was founded by thought leaders in the field of functional genomics and pioneers of CRISPR screening technologies. For more information, please visit the company’s website at and follow @ksq_tx on Twitter. View source version on businesswire.com:

October 11, 2017 By Mark Terry , BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff South San Francisco – Genentech , a Roche company, is growing and growing, it seems. The company was required by the City of South San Francisco to update its current Master Plan after 10 years. Although the company has not finalized or submitted the update, it’s possible it may almost double its facilities in South San Francisco, with 9 million square feet of space and a total of 30,000 employees. However, the plans are just that—projections—and have not been initiated or finalized. When the company does begin this process, it will be a planning exercise, providing the company and the city a forward-looking framework for long-term potential future development of its South San Francisco campus. This comes only a few months after its June announcement that it has started operating a second cell-culture facility at its Vacaville, Calif. manufacturing center, located about 55 miles from San Francisco. The new facility is part of a 500,000-square-foot expansion that costs almost $300 million in Solano County. This launch came shortly after the European Medicines Agency (EMA) approved a subdermal treatment for blood cancers. The other facility at the site, called CCP1, already manufactures an intravenous formulation of Rituxan called Rituxan IV. The new Rituxan SC formulation is also being manufactured for use in the U.S. Rituxan IV is the standard of care for B-cell non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Rituxan Hycela (basically the SC version) was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on June 23, 2017. It was approved for previously untreated and relapsed or refractory follicular lymphoma, previously untreated diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL), and previously untreated and previously treated chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). The different between it and Rutixan is a combination with hyaluronidase human, an enzyme that allows the drug to be delivered under the skin. The addition of the Vacaville plant is related to a significant number of expected approvals. Tony Pankau , vice president and general manager at the Vacaville facility, told the North Bay Business Journal in June, “Strategic decisions made about the timelines for starting up CCP2 were connected to an overarching strategy based on demand forecasts and production efficiencies across the entire Genentech/Roche global network. The exciting news is that as production demand has increased for our pipeline of more than 70 investigational medicines, CCP2 will now be able to provide us with much needed additional capacity.” It’s not all good news for Genentech. Last week Amgen filed a new lawsuit against the company in a California district court over Amgen’s recently-approved Avastin (bevacizumab) biosimilar, Mvasi. The suit claims that Mvasi has not infringed and won’t infringe on Genentech’s 27 patents for Avastin. Genentech claims that the 27 patents would be infringed by Amgen if it produces Mvasi in the U.S., and that is has already infringed on the patents by producing bevacizumab. The FDA approved Mvasi for Amgen and its partner Allergan on Sept. 14, 2017. All 17 members of the FDA’s Oncologic Drugs Advisory Committee voted in July to recommend the biosimilar for all of the indications, citing “clean and clear” evidence and “tight confidence intervals.” The approval in September was the first time the FDA approved a biosimilar for oncology indications. In 2016, Avastin brought in $6.75 billion in worldwide sales for Genentech.