Portola Pharmaceuticals Announces Promotions of Senior Management Team

Portola Pharmaceuticals Announces Promotions of Senior Management Team

SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif., Sept. 24 /PRNewswire/ -- Portola Pharmaceuticals, Inc. today announced executive promotions on the senior management team.

  • William Lis, vice president, Business & Commercial Development, has been promoted to the newly created position of chief operating officer. In this role, he will have responsibility for Corporate Development, Clinical Development and Pharmaceutical Development.
  • Daniel D. Gretler, M.D., vice president, Clinical Development & Regulatory Affairs, has been appointed chief medical officer.
  • Joseph Lambing, Ph.D., vice president, Pharmaceutical Development, has been promoted to senior vice president, Pharmaceutical Development.
  • David R. Phillips, Ph.D., senior vice president, Biology, has been named chief scientific officer. In this role, he will continue as head of Biology and will grow the Scientific Advisory Board to accommodate Portola's expanding product portfolio.

"These four senior executives have helped Portola achieve success to date with our diverse proprietary pipeline and global development and commercialization agreements with Novartis for elinogrel and Merck & Co., Inc. for betrixaban," said Charles Homcy, M.D., president and chief executive officer. "These organizational changes will position Portola for future success in several areas of our business, including our two partnered anti-thrombotic products; our discovery programs in cardiovascular disease and inflammation; and our corporate culture, which continues to foster integrity, innovation, transparency and opportunity."

About Portola Pharmaceuticals, Inc.

Portola Pharmaceuticals develops innovative therapeutics based on targets with established proofs of concept that are designed to provide significant advances over current treatments for cardiovascular disease and inflammation. The company has global development and commercialization agreements with two of the world's leading pharmaceutical companies collectively valued at about $1B in upfront and milestone payments plus escalating double-digit royalties on future sales. Betrixaban, its oral Factor Xa inhibitor is licensed to Merck & Co., Inc., and elinogrel, its P2Y(12)( )ADP receptor antagonist, is licensed to Novartis. Both betrixaban and elinogrel are Phase II product candidates that have best-in-class features to address the global multi-billion hospital, specialty, and chronic care anticoagulant and antiplatelet markets, respectively.

Portola also has proprietary pipeline programs focused on the discovery and development of a thromboxane receptor antagonist, which is targeted to address a significant unmet need as a potential aspirin alternative for patients intolerant to aspirin, and a novel recombinant protein anticoagulant antidote to help manage or reverse the bleeding complications in the tens of millions of patients expected to be treated with anticoagulants worldwide in the next decade. In addition, Portola is building a kinase program based on novel, specific Syk and JAK inhibitors to treat inflammatory diseases. For additional information, visit www.portola.com.