On July 24, 2019 TScan Therapeutics, dedicated to unleashing the power of the immune system through life-changing T cell therapies, reported its Series B financing, with over $48 million raised since the company’s inception (Press release, TScan Therapeutics, JUL 24, 2019, View Source [SID1234537709]). An experienced executive team has been built consisting of David P. Southwell, Chief Executive Officer; Gavin MacBeath PhD, Chief Scientific Officer; Henry Rath, Chief Business Officer; and Robert Crane, Chief Financial Officer. TScan is dedicated to realizing the true potential of T-cell receptor (TCR) therapy for patients suffering from a broad range of cancers.

Schedule your 30 min Free 1stOncology Demo!
Discover why more than 1,500 members use 1stOncology™ to excel in:

Early/Late Stage Pipeline Development - Target Scouting - Clinical Biomarkers - Indication Selection & Expansion - BD&L Contacts - Conference Reports - Combinatorial Drug Settings - Companion Diagnostics - Drug Repositioning - First-in-class Analysis - Competitive Analysis - Deals & Licensing

                  Schedule Your 30 min Free Demo!

"TScan is committed to unleashing the immune system in patients with the only genome-wide, high-throughput and unbiased system to discover the natural targets of TCRs. Through the pioneering work of Dr. Elledge, TScan’s technology platform has the potential to uncover new targets in a variety of diseases, including cancer, autoimmunity, and infectious disease. We have made significant progress in discovering novel targets which are shared across cancers and look forward to bringing TCR therapies to patient suffering from both liquid and solid tumors," commented David Southwell, Chief Executive Officer of TScan.

"Further, I am proud that we have assembled an outstanding team of executives, including Gavin, Henry and Bob, and scientists from leading cell therapy companies – along with top-tier investors – to drive development of these products internally and to work externally with corporate partners," continued Southwell. "We are pleased to welcome Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research to our Series B financing, as they join the strong core of investors from our Series A round of financing."

Dr. Stephen Elledge, Professor of Genetics and of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, spearheaded the development of the TScan system utilizing ground-breaking technology developed in his lab. Dr. Elledge is internationally recognized for his pioneering work in DNA damage repair and was the recipient of the 2015 Lasker Prize in Basic Medicine and the 2017 Breakthrough Prize in the life sciences.

TScan’s approach is comprehensive, unbiased, and relies on natural processes in both T cells and cancer cells to identify physiologically relevant targets and to develop effective T cell therapies for patients.

"Within the tumors of cancer patients are T cells with the potential to recognize and eliminate those cancer cells," said Gavin MacBeath, PhD, Chief Scientific Officer of TScan. "We are identifying tumor-reactive T cells in patients that are winning their fight against cancer in order to discover the targets of their T cells and develop innovative, cell-based therapies for the many patients that are not so fortunate. Importantly, we believe the TScan technology will enable us to expand the currently limited range of targets for T cell therapy."

About the TScan Leadership Team

David Southwell, Chief Executive Officer
David Southwell is the Chief Executive Officer of TScan and also serves as a member of the Company’s Board of Directors. Previously, David served as President and Chief Executive Officer of Inotek Pharmaceuticals through Inotek’s merger with Rocket Pharmaceuticals, a gene therapy-based biotechnology company. Previously, Mr. Southwell served as Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer of Human Genome Sciences, until its merger with GlaxoSmithKline plc. and as Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Sepracor Inc., sold to Dainippon Sumitomo. Mr. Southwell is a member of the Board of Directors of Rocket Pharmaceuticals and PTC Therapeutics, and has also served on the Boards of Directors of Human Genome Sciences, THL Credit Inc., Inventiv Health, Biosphere Medical, Inotek Pharmaceuticals and Spero Therapeutics. In addition, Mr. Southwell serves on the Board of Advisers at the Tuck School at Dartmouth College, from which he received an MBA, and has a BA from Rice University.

Gavin MacBeath, PhD, Chief Scientific Officer
Gavin MacBeath joined TScan from AbPro where he served as the Chief Scientific Officer. Gavin has two decades of experience in academia and industry, founding companies and driving research from early-stage discovery through drug approval. Previously, Dr. MacBeath served as Co-founder and SVP of Discovery at Merrimack Pharmaceuticals. Dr. MacBeath began his career in academia, where he served as the first fellow at Harvard’s Bauer Center for Genomics Research, as an Assistant and later Associate Professor in the Department of Chemistry & Chemical Biology at Harvard University, and as a Lecturer and Principal Investigator at Harvard Medical School. Dr. MacBeath received his undergraduate degree from the University of Manitoba, his Ph.D. from The Scripps Research Institute, and postdoctoral training with Dr. Stuart Schreiber at Harvard University.

Henry Rath, Chief Business Officer
Henry Rath joined TScan from Seres Therapeutics where he served as Senior Vice President of Corporate Development. Henry has over 25 years of experience in the biotechnology industry with roles spanning corporate finance, strategy, and business development. Prior to joining Seres, Henry served in various leadership roles at Amgen, Catabasis Pharmaceuticals, and Baxter BioScience Mr. Rath began his career with roles in the banking and consulting industries focusing on biotechnology with Oppenheimer & Co. Inc. and LEK Consulting. Mr. Rath earned his undergraduate degree from Harvard College and his M.B.A. from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Robert Crane, Chief Financial Officer
Robert Crane has served as Chief Financial Officer from company formation in April 2018. Mr. Crane has served as Chief Financial Officer and other senior roles in over 30 companies including Sirtris (acquired by GSK); I-STAT (acquired by Abbott); InKine (acquired by Salix); Seragen (acquired by Ligand), deCODE (acquired by Amgen) and Circe (acquired by ICN Pharmaceuticals). Mr. Crane was previously a partner at venture capital firm Montgomery Ventures and chairman of the American Bicycle Group. Mr. Crane holds a Bachelor of Science from MIT and an MBA from Stanford.

On July 23, 2019 Quest Diagnostics Incorporated (NYSE: DGX), the world’s leading provider of diagnostic information services, reported financial results for the second quarter ended June 30, 2019 (Press release, Quest Diagnostics, JUL 23, 2019, View Source [SID1234537660]).

Schedule your 30 min Free 1stOncology Demo!
Discover why more than 1,500 members use 1stOncology™ to excel in:

Early/Late Stage Pipeline Development - Target Scouting - Clinical Biomarkers - Indication Selection & Expansion - BD&L Contacts - Conference Reports - Combinatorial Drug Settings - Companion Diagnostics - Drug Repositioning - First-in-class Analysis - Competitive Analysis - Deals & Licensing

                  Schedule Your 30 min Free Demo!

"Our volume growth accelerated in the second quarter due to our expanded network access, and we continued to build momentum through the first half of 2019," said Steve Rusckowski, Chairman, CEO and President. "This strong volume growth combined with our strategy to drive operational excellence helped offset the significant reimbursement pressures we are experiencing this year. We are excited by our new Preferred Lab Network status within UnitedHealthcare, which represents a multi-year opportunity that will build over time."

For further details impacting the year-over-year comparisons related to operating income, operating income as a percentage of net revenues, income from continuing operations attributable to Quest Diagnostics, and diluted EPS from continuing operations, see note 2 of the financial tables attached below.

Beginning in 2019, the company has changed how it presents adjusted income measures to additionally exclude amortization expense for all periods presented. We believe this presentation provides investors with additional insight to evaluate our performance period over period and relative to competitors, as well as to analyze the underlying trends in our business.

The outlook for reported diluted EPS from continuing operations was updated to greater than $5.29 from the previous outlook of greater than $5.16 due to the impact of special items in the second quarter. For a reconciliation of adjusted diluted EPS to reported diluted EPS from continuing operations, see note 5 to the financial tables attached below.

Note on Non-GAAP Financial Measures

As used in this press release the term "reported" refers to measures under the accounting principles generally accepted in the United States ("GAAP"). The term "adjusted" refers to non-GAAP operating performance measures that exclude special items such as restructuring and integration charges, amortization expense, excess tax benefit ("ETB") associated with stock-based compensation and other items.

Non-GAAP adjusted measures are presented because management believes those measures are useful adjuncts to GAAP results. Non-GAAP adjusted measures should not be considered as an alternative to the corresponding measures determined under GAAP. Management may use these non-GAAP measures to evaluate our performance period over period and relative to competitors, to analyze the underlying trends in our business, to establish operational budgets and forecasts and for incentive compensation purposes. We believe that these non-GAAP measures are useful to investors and analysts to evaluate our performance period over period and relative to competitors, as well as to analyze the underlying trends in our business and to assess our performance. The additional tables attached below include reconciliations of non-GAAP adjusted measures to GAAP measures.

Conference Call Information

Quest Diagnostics will hold its quarterly conference call to discuss financial results beginning at 8:30 a.m. Eastern Time today. The conference call can be accessed by dialing 888-455-0391 within the U.S. and Canada, or 773-756-0467 internationally, passcode: Investor; or via live webcast on the company’s website at www.QuestDiagnostics.com/investor. The company suggests participants dial in approximately 10 minutes before the call.

A replay of the call may be accessed online at www.QuestDiagnostics.com/investor or by phone at 800-871-1320 for domestic callers or 402-280-1688 for international callers. No passcode is required. Telephone replays will be available from approximately 10:30 a.m. Eastern Time on July 23, 2019 until midnight Eastern Time on August 6, 2019. Anyone listening to the call is encouraged to read the company’s periodic reports, on file with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including the discussion of risk factors and historical results of operations and financial condition in those reports.

On July 23, 2019 LifeSpan BioSciences, Inc. (LSBio), the industry leader in molecular pathology, reported the first release of its PathPlus series of antibodies (Press release, LifeSpan BioSciences, JUL 23, 2019, View Source [SID1234537676]). These 565 antibodies were selected from among thousands tested and identified to be the best performing reagents for immunohistochemical detection of 200 high-value cancer targets in formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded human tissues.

Schedule your 30 min Free 1stOncology Demo!
Discover why more than 1,500 members use 1stOncology™ to excel in:

Early/Late Stage Pipeline Development - Target Scouting - Clinical Biomarkers - Indication Selection & Expansion - BD&L Contacts - Conference Reports - Combinatorial Drug Settings - Companion Diagnostics - Drug Repositioning - First-in-class Analysis - Competitive Analysis - Deals & Licensing

                  Schedule Your 30 min Free Demo!

Antibody validation has become an industry roadblock as thousands of antibodies have become available to customers who face difficult choices in determining which antibodies are the best performers for each application, including immunohistochemistry, flow cytometry, ELISA, Western blot, or immunofluorescence. Antibodies that perform well in one assay, such as IHC, may not be the most specific reagent for another assay, such as flow cytometry.

"Identifying the optimal reagents to use in their experiments is a pain point for researchers," said LSBio CEO Heather Holemon. "There is a tremendous need to identify the best performers in every application from among the hundreds of antibodies that are currently available to each target."

LSBio has initiated a program to systematically identify the best performing antibodies in each application. Its initial focus is to identify those antibodies that are the best performers in immunohistochemistry on formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissues. With a tissue archive of over two million samples, and more than 20 years’ experience performing IHC for pharma and biotech customers, LSBio is uniquely qualified to determine which reagents are the best-in class.

Immunohistochemistry, which is the technique used by pathologists to classify tumors, is a powerful method of antibody validation because it can be used to visualize the binding of an antibody to individual cell types within complex tissues and to subcellular structures within cells such as nuclei or cell membranes. Comparing the specific binding characteristics of multiple antibodies to the same target allows LSBio to identify those that have the highest degree of specificity and least nonspecific staining.

LSBio uses a stringent validation protocol that involves blinded IHC testing of up to 20 different antibodies to a target protein on a tissue microarray containing 21 different human tissue types. The results for each antibody are analyzed and compared in order to rank them by performance. Those antibodies that show the highest specificity and least nonspecific staining on formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissues are offered under the PathPlus brand.

"We have a unique opportunity to leverage our leadership position in antibody validation to set the standard for providing high-quality IHC antibodies to the research and pharmaceutical communities," said Glenna Burmer, M.D., Ph.D., Chief Scientific Officer of LifeSpan. "We plan to offer multiple series of PathPlus validated reagents as we evaluate antibodies to the most important targets in the human genome."

On July 23, 2019 Ultragenyx Pharmaceutical Inc. (NASDAQ: RARE), a biopharmaceutical company focused on the development of novel products for serious rare and ultra-rare genetic diseases, reported that it will host a conference call on Thursday, August 1, 2019 at 5pm ET to discuss second quarter 2019 financial results and provide a corporate update (Press release, Ultragenyx Pharmaceutical, JUL 23, 2019, http://ir.ultragenyx.com/news-releases/news-release-details/ultragenyx-host-conference-call-second-quarter-2019-financial [SID1234537661]).

Schedule your 30 min Free 1stOncology Demo!
Discover why more than 1,500 members use 1stOncology™ to excel in:

Early/Late Stage Pipeline Development - Target Scouting - Clinical Biomarkers - Indication Selection & Expansion - BD&L Contacts - Conference Reports - Combinatorial Drug Settings - Companion Diagnostics - Drug Repositioning - First-in-class Analysis - Competitive Analysis - Deals & Licensing

                  Schedule Your 30 min Free Demo!

The live and replayed webcast of the call will be available through the company’s website at View Source To participate in the live call by phone, dial (855) 797-6910 (USA) or (262) 912-6260 (International) and enter the passcode 6298416. The replay of the call will be available for one year.

On July 23, 2019 Crescendo Biologics Ltd (Crescendo), the drug developer of novel, targeted T-cell enhancing therapeutics, reported that Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited (Takeda), has exercised a second option under its existing, multi-target collaboration and license agreement (Press release, Crescendo Biologics, JUL 23, 2019, View Source [SID1234537677]). Takeda has taken an exclusive license to Humabodies directed to another of its oncology targets.

Schedule your 30 min Free 1stOncology Demo!
Discover why more than 1,500 members use 1stOncology™ to excel in:

Early/Late Stage Pipeline Development - Target Scouting - Clinical Biomarkers - Indication Selection & Expansion - BD&L Contacts - Conference Reports - Combinatorial Drug Settings - Companion Diagnostics - Drug Repositioning - First-in-class Analysis - Competitive Analysis - Deals & Licensing

                  Schedule Your 30 min Free Demo!

This is the second license option that Takeda has exercised under the agreement with Crescendo and relates to the continued progression of an immuno-oncology programme. The license marks the successful delivery and further pre-clinical evaluation by Takeda of Humabody leads meeting its stringent criteria.

Theodora Harold, CEO of Crescendo, commented:

"This exciting news further underlines Crescendo’s ability to deliver innovative Humabody therapeutics which consistently meet the exacting specifications set by Takeda for progression towards the clinic. We are delighted that our close collaboration with Takeda continues to be so productive and we look forward to more successes in the future."

Chris Arendt, Head, Oncology Drug Discovery Unit & Immunology Unit, Takeda, commented:

"We are pleased that our partnership with Crescendo has continued to be fruitful in leading to another successful in-licensing milestone. This exciting immuno-oncology candidate Humabody that our teams have advanced through close collaboration aligns well with our ongoing efforts to pursue diverse modalities with transformative treatment potential."

Takeda’s option is part of the existing multi-target collaboration and license agreement announced in October 2016 in which Takeda received the right to develop and commercialize Humabody-based therapeutics resulting from the collaboration. Under the agreement, Crescendo is eligible to receive clinical development, regulatory and sales-based milestone payments of up to $754 million plus royalties on Humabody-based product sales by Takeda.