Ex-Biogen chief resurfaces as CEO of start-up Vir Biotechnology

9 January 2017

Friday saw the launch of a new US biotech company, Vir Biotechnology, which is focussed developing cures, treatments and preventions for challenging infectious diseases, with former Biogen chief executive George Scangos heading a team of scientific and industry leaders.

The company will be headquartered in the San Francisco, California, area and will seek to apply immune programming at an unprecedented scale.

Vir is adopting a broad technological portfolio, including the viral vectors obtained through the acquisition of TomegaVax. These technologies were originally developed by a team at Oregon Health & Science University, led by Louis Picker and Klaus Frueh, both grantees of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

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