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"I am delighted that Keith McCullagh has agreed to take over from me asAffitech's new chairman. He has an outstanding entrepreneurial track recordin the biopharmaceutical industry, most recently at Santaris Pharma inDenmark, where as CE0 he has played a major role in establishing the companyas a leader in the RNA medicines field. Affitech's antibody technology is ina different area of the biopharmaceuticals market, but I am confident thatAffitech will benefit from his leadership and guidance. I wish him everysuccess."
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Accepting the appointment, Keith McCullagh commented:
"Affitech has significant potential in the field of human monoclonalantibody therapeutics. Both its cell-based and target antigen screeningtechnology is at the forefront of the industry and I look forward toassisting the Company's management, board and shareholders to build theresources and competencies required to develop innovative potential newproducts. I look forward to Affitech achieving several competitive commercialgoals in the coming years."
Affitech intends to focus its future development on building a pipelineof proprietary therapeutic antibody product candidates, through both in-houseresearch and development and alliances with other companies.
Affitech CEO, Dr Martin Welschof, commented:
"I thank Oyvin Broymer, who took over the chairmanship of Affitech in2002 at a time of major strategic change and has skillfully guided us to ourcurrent position. I look forward to working closely with Keith McCullagh,whose experience in building successful biotech companies will be of greatvalue as we enter the next phase of Affitech's growth and development."
Affitech also announced that Thomas von Rueden has retired as a director,having completed his term of office.
Notes to Editors:
About Affitech
Affitech AS is a privately held human therapeutic antibody discovery anddevelopment company with headquarters and R&D facilities in Oslo, Norway andits US subsidiary in the San Francisco Bay Area. The Company's currentdisease focus is oncology and it utilizes two discrete but unique approachesfor the discovery of fully human antibodies - (i) Molecule Based AntibodyDiscovery, and (ii) Cell Based Antibody Discovery. Molecule Based AntibodyDiscovery involves proprietary PhagemidScreeN and AffiScreeN(TM) technologiesand uses validated targets for discovery purpose. Cell Based AntibodyDiscovery is based on CBAS(TM) technology, which is a "reverse-screening"approach for discovering antibodies and their cognate targets utilizingdisease-specific cells. Several of the Company's proprietary productcandidates currently in development were generated by CBAS(TM). Affitech alsosells its proprietary Protein L product line for the purification of antibodyand antibody fragments. Affitech offers collaborators a flexible businessmodel and competitive price structure with low royalty stacking. The Companyhas concluded deals with commercial organizations such as Roche, Peregrine,Omeros, XOMA, NatImmune, Viventia, Dyax, Micromet, Pharmexa and others.Further information at http://www.affitech.com.
About Keith McCullagh
Keith McCullagh, PhD, BVSc, MRCVS, is an experienced bioscienceentrepreneur, having founded and built three previous companies in the lifescience industry. Most recently, from October 2003 to June 2008, he was CEOof Santaris Pharma, a Danish biopharmaceutical company. From 2000 to 2003 hewas executive chairman of OnMedica Group plc, a European pharmaceuticale-detailing business and sinc
