Cancer metabolism-focused Tyme Technologies signed a new acting chief medical officer four months after it shuffled its C-suite to make room for a new CEO. Jan Van Tornout, M.D., arrives after holding positions in both biopharma and academia and replaces Giuseppe del Priore, M.D.
Van Tornout led clinical management and oncology teams at various life sciences companies including Amgen, Bristol Myers Squibb and Astellas and has been a medical strategy consultant for the likes of GlaxoSmithKline, Puma Biotechnology and Maverick Therapeutics.
He also held academic roles at the University of Southern California and worked as a pediatric hematologist-oncologist at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles.
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“Jan has played an integral role in the approval of multiple drug candidates and has served as a key advisor in all facets of drug development. We will greatly benefit from his expertise on how best to advance our pipeline, as well as his guidance on the components that comprise high quality submissions to the FDA,” said Tyme CEO Richie Cunningham in a statement. Cunningham himself joined Tyme at the end of November 2020, taking the helm from Steve Hoffman, the company’s co-founder and CEO since 2015, who moved into the chief scientific officer role.
Tyme is working on treatments that exploit the metabolic weaknesses of cancer cells to kill them and expose them to the immune system. Its treatment, SM-88 (racemetyrosine), is designed to alter protein synthesis, increase oxidative stress and change other metabolic factors that affect the ability of cancer cells to survive.
The company presented data at the virtual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research in June 2020 showing that the oral drug disrupted autophagy in two types of pancreatic cancer cells. Often called the cell’s garbage disposal, autophagy is the process by which cells clear out unwanted material such as proteins, organelles and pathogens.
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Tyme is testing SM-88 in a phase 2/3 study of patients with pancreatic cancer whose disease has worsened despite trying two prior therapies. It is also developing a nasal form of the treatment for brain cancers and an injectable version for digestively compromised patients.