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Oncology: The Forecast for the Melanoma Market - Partly Sunny or Mostly Cloudy?

Tuesday, February 10th
12:30 - 1:35 pm
East Foyer

As the seventh most common cancer in the United States, malignant melanoma represents 75% of skin cancer deaths in the U.S.  However, the large and growing unmet medical need is also a siren song for hopeful oncology drug developers.  Spontaneous remissions make early studies notoriously unreliable.  Will pivotal melanoma studies in 2009 once again disappoint, or will an emerging company triumph in oncology’s most coveted and elusive indication?  Hear oncologists from industry and academia opine on the future of melanoma treatment options and how best to circumvent the difficulties of clinical trial design.

Moderator

Panelists

Who's Who

Michael King; Mr. King recently became Head of Healthcare where he will leverage his 15 years of experience as a sellside analyst to provide advice to companies on financings, partnerships and strategic transactions/restructurings. Prior to that, Mr. King was a managing director and senior biotechnology analyst. He joined Rodman & Renshaw in this capacity May of 2005 and became director of research in January of 2006. Prior to joining Rodman & Renshaw, Mr. King was a managing director and senior equity research analyst in the Health Care Group at Banc of America Securities LLC where he covered the biotechnology sector for three years. Mr. King joined Banc of America Securities in 2002 from Robertson Stephens, where he had been a managing director and senior biotechnology analyst since 1998. Prior to that, he served as senior biotechnology analyst at Vector Securities from 1996 to 1998 and at Dillon, Read & Co. from 1994 to 1996. King has also held positions at D. Blech & Company, Alex Brown and Sons, Hambrecht & Quist and Kidder, Peabody & Company. He earned a BBA with honors in finance from Baruch College. Mr. King was ranked fourth for his stock-picking accuracy in The Wall Street Journal's annual "Best on the Street" survey in 2001 and was given the Institutional Investor Home-Run Hitter award in 2000 for his coverage of OSI Pharmaceuticals. He was most recently ranked as number 11 in the Institutional Investor poll of biotechnology analysts, and as a runner-up in the hedge fund subset of the poll.

Safi R. Bahcall, Ph.D.; Dr. Bahcall co-founded Synta with Dr. Lan Bo Chen and has been Chief Executive Officer and a member of the board of directors since July 2001, and President since December 2003. Dr. Bahcall has led Synta from inception through multiple acquisitions, financings, an initial public offering, and the establishment of integrated, multi-product drug discovery and development organization. Prior to founding Synta, Dr. Bahcall was a consultant at McKinsey & Company advising investment banks and pharmaceutical companies on strategy, technology, and operations. Dr. Bahcall also co-founded a drug discovery company focused on novel ion channel research, now part of Synta. He received his B.A. summa cum laude from Harvard University, was awarded his Ph.D. from Stanford University in theoretical physics, and was a Miller postdoctoral fellow at U.C. Berkeley.

Geoffrey M. Nichol, MD, M.B.Ch.B., M.B.A.; Dr. Nichol is Senior Vice President, Product Development. Dr. Nichol is responsible for the development of Medarex's product portfolio, including clinical development, regulatory affairs and quality assurance, project management and pre-clinical development. Prior to joining Medarex in September 2002, Dr. Nichol was with SmithKline Beecham Pharmaceutical (currently GlaxoSmithKline), as a Clinical Research Physician from December 1989 through January 1996. In February 1996, Dr. Nichol joined Novartis Pharmaceuticals as Vice President, Pulmonology, Arthritis and HRT in Clinical Research and Development and subsequently led U.S. Medical Affairs and Global Project Management for Novartis. Dr. Nichol received his medical degree from Otago University Medical School in New Zealand and practiced pulmonary/internal medicine in New Zealand, Australia and at the Brompton Hospital and National Heart and Lung Institute in London, England. Dr. Nichol also received an M.B.A. degree from Warwick University in the United Kingdom.

Gary K. Schwartz, MD; Gary K. Schwartz, MD is Chief, Melanoma and Sarcoma Service at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC). Dr. Schwartz is a medical oncologist who specializes in the identification and development of new targeted drugs for cancer therapy, particularly in the treatment of patients with gastrointestinal cancers and sarcomas. These agents are not disease specific and hold promise in the treatment of all solid tumor malignancies. His research studies have been supported by the National Cancer Institute, the Lustgarten Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer, the Department of Defense for Breast Cancer Research, the Byrne Foundation, the Food and Drug Administration, and the generous philanthropic support of MSKCC patients and their families.

Anna Pavlick, MD; Dr. Pavlick is an Associate Professor of Medicine and Dermatology in the Division of Medical Oncology at New York University Cancer Institute and Director of the NYU Melanoma Program. Dr. Pavlick is an academic clinical researcher focused in malignant melanoma and sarcoma. She has significant experience with many immunotherapies, biologics, targeted therapies, and novel chemotherapeutics for malignant melanoma.

Raymond P. Warrell, Jr., MD; Dr. Warrell is Chief Executive Officer and a member of the Board since December 1999 and a Chairman since January 2001.  From 1978 to 1999, Dr. Warrell was associated with the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York, where he held tenured positions as Member, Attending Physician, and Associate Physician-in-Chief, and with the Cornell University Medical College, where he was Professor of Medicine. Dr. Warrell also has more than 20 years of development and consulting experience in pharmaceuticals and biotechnology products. He was a co-founder and chairman of the scientific advisory board of PolaRx Biopharmaceuticals, Inc., which originated TrisenoxR, a drug for the treatment of acute promyelocytic leukemia. Dr. Warrell holds or has filed numerous patents and patent applications for biomedical therapeutic or diagnostic agents. He has published more than 100 peer-reviewed papers and more than 240 book chapters and abstracts, most of which are focused upon drug development in oncology. Dr. Warrell is a member of the American Society of Clinical Investigation, the American Society of Hematology, the American Association for Cancer Research and the American Society of Clinical Oncology. Among many awards, he has received the U.S. Public Health Service Award for Exceptional Achievement in Orphan Drug Development from the FDA.