Appointments

YM BioSciences Inc. announces the appointment of Dr. Nick Glover to the newly created position of president and chief operating officer. Dr. Glover will provide broad leader-

ship to the company and have primary responsibility for its operations and infrastructure, in particular the development and commercialization of YM’s pipeline. Dr. Glover was formerly the president and chief executive officer at Viventia Biotech Inc., a biopharmaceutical company involved in the discovery and development of monoclonal antibodybased technologies for the treatment of cancer. While at Viventia, Dr. Glover led the strategic development of a novel monoclonal antibody discovery platform, advancing three clinical products including a Phase III antibody for the treatment of advanced head and neck cancer. He has been responsible for all aspects of biotherapeutic development, including GMP manufacturing, and has taken products from discovery, through preclinical development and into global registration clinical trials, with a specific focus in oncology. In addition to his operational experience, Dr. Glover has a significant background in business development, concluding numerous licensing and partnering agreements in both academia and industry, with organizations such as the University of Cambridge, Micromet AG and Merck KGaA. Prior to joining Viventia, Dr. Glover was an investment manager for a leading venture capital firm. Dr. Glover holds a B.Sc. (Hons) in Chemistry from the University of East Anglia, U.K., a M.Sc. in Chemistry from the University of British Columbia, Canada, and Ph.D. in Chemistry from Simon Fraser University, Canada.

Xenon Pharmaceuticals Inc. announces that it has appointed Dr. Tarek S. Mansour as executive vice president, Research and Development. “We are delighted to welcome Tarek to the Xenon team,” commented Simon Pimstone, Xenon’s president and CEO. “Tarek is a world-class R&D executive whose experience in discovering products, a number of which are now on the market, will further enhance Xenon’s capabilities. Tarek has had the unique experience of holding senior leadership positions within both biotech and more traditional pharmaceutical companies. His successful careers at Biochem Pharma and Wyeth Pharmaceuticals (now Pfizer) have armed Tarek with best-in-class drug discovery and development practice and we are confident that Tarek will make a major contribution to Xenon’s future innovative R&D efforts.” Dr. Mansour has spent nearly 25 years in the life sciences industry with positions at Biochem Pharma, and Wyeth Pharmaceuticals (now Pfizer). His most recent position at Wyeth Research was as VP, Chemical Sciences Head over multiple research sites. Dr. Mansour received his PhD in Chemistry from the University of Missouri, Columbia.

Allostera Pharma Inc. has appointed Dr. Christopher Henney, as chairman of its Board of Directors. Dr. Henney began his professional career as an academic immunologist and has published over 200 papers in the peer reviewed literature. Dr. Henney has held professorships at the Johns Hopkins University Medical School in Baltimore and at the University of Washington in Seattle. He held the first chair in Basic Immunology at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center in Seattle. In 1980, together with Steven Gillis, he co-founded Immunex Corporation in Seattle, where he served as executive vice president, scientific director and vice chairman of the Board of Directors. Immunex developed two FDA approved drugs, one of which, Enbrel® (etanercept), is one of the leading products by sales produced by the biotechnology industry. In 1989, together with George Rathmann (co-founder of Amgen), Henney co-founded Icos Corporation. He served as a director and chief scientific officer of the company until 1995. The company was subsequently acquired by Eli Lilly in 2005 for over $2 billion. In 1995, Henney became the first CEO and Chairman of Dendreon Corporation. The company became publicly listed on the Nasdaq National Market in 2000 and Henney remained as CEO until 2003 and as Executive Chairman until 2005.

Immunovaccine Inc. announces Paul Kirkconnell has been appointed to its Board of Directors. With extensive experience in global business development strategies for biopharmaceutical companies, Mr. Kirkconnell will also serve on the Board’s Audit Committee. Most recently, Mr. Kirkconnell was managing director of DRI Capital, a $1 billion healthcare investment company. Prior to this, Mr. Kirkconnell was president of Aventis Capital, the predecessor investment arm of Sanofi-Aventis and responsible for the management of Aventis’ $750 million global capital fund. He also served as corporate vice president of Business Development of Aventis Pasteur where he led their worldwide vaccine business development programs, evaluating corporate acquisitions, and was responsible for deal structures and terms with respect to licensing opportunities.

Dr. Alain Beaudet, president of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), along with CIHR’s governing council; announce the appointment of Dr. Paul Lasko as scientific director of CIHR’s Institute of Genetics. Dr. Lasko is currently the chair of the Department of Biology at McGill University; he holds the James McGill professorship and was Molson chair of Genetics from 2001 to 2007. He has been highly active in research grant adjudication and has served on CIHR or Canadian Cancer Society grant panels continuously since 1995. He is also a member of the Institute of Genetics Priority and Planning Committee for Developmental Genetics and Birth Defects. In addition to this academic work, Dr. Lasko is the President of the Genetics Society of Canada and has also worked extensively with the Human Frontiers of Science Program Organization (HFSP) over the past ten years, serving on its program grant panel from 20012005, and since then as one of two Canadian representatives on the council of scientists. He has chaired the HFSP council of scientists since 2007.

Dr. Nick Glover