ORIC Has Appointed Rich Heyman, PhD as Acting Chief Executive Officer and Leonard Reyno, MD as Chief Medical Officer

SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 20, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- ORIC Pharmaceuticals ("ORIC") announces that Rich Heyman, PhD has been appointed acting Chief Executive Officer and Leonard Reyno, MD has joined as Executive Vice President and Chief Medical Officer.

ORIC is a privately held oncology company focused on addressing mechanisms of resistance. Its lead candidate, ORIC-101, is the subject of an ongoing Phase 1a study and a potent small molecule inhibitor of the glucocorticoid receptor (GR).

"I'm looking forward to increasing my involvement with ORIC," said Dr. Heyman, acting Chief Executive Officer. "It's a very exciting time as ORIC transitions from a research-stage to a development-stage company. Leonard Reyno's significant oncology development expertise will be a tremendous asset to ORIC. We're pleased he has joined."

"ORIC has an outstanding research team with deep scientific expertise, along with respected and highly-engaged scientific advisors and founders," said Dr. Reyno. "The previous work on the role of the glucocorticoid receptor axis in oncology therapy resistance, along with data from the pre-clinical setting and the ongoing Phase 1a study, will be instrumental in informing our development efforts with ORIC-101 going forward."

About Rich Heyman, PhD

Dr. Rich Heyman has over 25 years of biopharma experience. He previously served as CEO of Seragon Pharmaceuticals, a company focused on drugs targeting hormone dependent cancers acquired by the Roche Group, as co-founder and CEO of Aragon Pharmaceuticals, purchased by Johnson & Johnson in 2013, as co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer of X-Ceptor Therapeutics, and as Vice President of Research at Ligand Pharmaceuticals.  At Ligand he led the development of Panretin® and Targretin®, retinoids approved by the FDA for the treatment of cancer. He is the author or inventor on more than 120 publications and patents. In addition to serving on the Board of Directors for ORIC, Dr. Heyman also serves on the Board of Directors for Gritstone Oncology, Yumanity Therapeutics, Metacrine Inc , Vividion Therapeutics and Mavu Pharma.  He is also the Vice Chairman of The Salk Institute. He was a NIH postdoctoral fellow at the Salk Institute, and received a Ph.D. in pharmacology from the University of Minnesota and a B.S. in chemistry from the University of Connecticut.

About Leonard Reyno, MD

Dr. Reyno most recently served as Senior Vice President and Chief Medical Officer at Agensys, a subsidiary of Astellas Pharma, where he led clinical stage development through clinical proof of concept. Dr. Reyno's prior positions in industry included Global Medical Director for Taxotere/Breast cancer at Aventis, Medical Director and Lead Clinical Scientist for Herceptin at Genentech and Senior Director of Oncology at Cytokinetics. Before joining industry, Dr. Reyno was an academic oncologist, where he had both extensive experience as a clinician (especially in breast and genitor-urinary malignancy) as well as serving as Principal Investigator on multiple trials with the National Cancer Institute of Canada. Dr. Reyno was Head of Medical Oncology and the Oncology Clinical Research Unit at Dalhousie University from 1999- 2003, and previously Associate Professor of Medicine at McMaster University from 1993-1999. Dr. Reyno received his MD from McMaster University in 1986.  He completed fellowships in internal medicine and medical oncology at McMaster and further training in drug development at the University of Maryland at Baltimore as the McEachern Fellow of the National Cancer Institute of Canada from 1991-1993. He has authored more than 25 scientific publications in major journals.

About ORIC Pharmaceuticals

ORIC Pharmaceuticals is a privately held oncology company focused on making cancer treatments more effective by addressing mechanisms of resistance. ORIC was founded by Drs. Charles Sawyers MD and Scott Lowe PhD, who have strong records of discovering innovative treatments and targets in cancer. The company has assembled strong leadership and scientific teams and a Board with extensive experience in drug development and financing. It is funded by leading biotechnology investors, including The Column Group, Topspin Partners, OrbiMed Advisors, EcoR1 Capital, Foresite Capital, and Kravis Investment Partners. ORIC is headquartered in South San Francisco, California.

For more information, please contact:
Krys Corbett
650-388-5622
[email protected] 
http://oricpharma.com/

SOURCE ORIC Pharma

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