CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Obsidian Therapeutics, Inc., a clinical-stage biotechnology company pioneering engineered cell and gene therapies, today announced the appointment of Dana Alexander as Chief Technical Officer.

“Dana has over two decades of operational expertise across cell therapy, gene therapy and biologics process development and chemistry, manufacturing, and controls (CMC), from Phase 1 through commercialization,” said Madan Jagasia, M.D., Chief Executive Officer of Obsidian. “His leadership will be instrumental as we continue leveraging our proprietary cytoDRiVE^® platform to advance our lead tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte (TIL) cell therapy, OBX-115, through clinical development for the treatment of solid tumors. We are delighted to welcome Dana to our management team.”

“I am thrilled to be joining the highly accomplished and passionate Obsidian leadership team and to have the opportunity to grow and expand the company’s CMC capabilities,” said Mr. Alexander. “I look forward to collaborating with the team to advance OBX-115 and maximizing the company’s platform for manufacturing patient-specific engineered cell and gene therapies as Obsidian’s pipeline expands.”

Mr. Alexander most recently served as Senior Vice President of Technical Operations at AlloVir, where he was responsible for building and leading all CMC technical functions including manufacturing, process and analytical development, supply chain, CMC program management and quality operations. Previously, Mr. Alexander held roles as Vice President of Operations, Viral Vector Services at Thermo Fisher Scientific (Brammer Bio) and Chief Operations Officer at Anika Therapeutics. He also spent 14 years at Sanofi Genzyme in roles of increasing responsibility in CMC operations. Mr. Alexander holds an M.B.A. from Boston University and a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from Northeastern University.

About OBX-115
Obsidian’s lead investigational cytoTIL15™ program, OBX-115, is a novel engineered tumor-derived autologous T cell immunotherapy (tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte [TIL] cell therapy) armored with pharmacologically regulatable membrane-bound IL15 (mbIL15). OBX-115 has the potential to become a meaningful therapeutic option for patients with advanced or metastatic melanoma and other solid tumors by leveraging the expected benefits of mbIL15 and Obsidian’s proprietary, differentiated manufacturing process to enhance persistence, antitumor activity, and clinical safety of TIL cell therapy. OBX-115 is being investigated in two ongoing clinical trials in advanced or metastatic melanoma and non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) (NCT05470283 and NCT06060613).

About Obsidian Therapeutics
Obsidian Therapeutics, Inc. is a clinical-stage biotechnology company pioneering engineered cell and gene therapies to deliver transformative outcomes for patients with intractable diseases. Obsidian’s proprietary cytoDRiVE^® technology is designed to precisely regulate the timing and level of protein function by using FDA-approved small-molecule drugs. Obsidian is headquartered in Cambridge, MA. The Company has collaborations with Bristol Myers Squibb and Vertex Pharmaceuticals. For more information, please visit www.obsidiantx.com and follow us on LinkedIn.

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