– CANADA, Burnaby – Xenon Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: XENE), a neurology-focused biopharmaceutical company, today announced that as part of the leadership transition, Dr. Simon Pimstone, co-founder and CEO, will step down from his current role as CEO to assume the new role of Executive Chair of the Board of Directors, succeeding Michael Tarnow who will not be standing for re-election at the 2021 annual meeting of shareholders.
The company also announced that Ian Mortimer, current President, and CFO, will be appointed as President and CEO and will also be nominated for election as a director at the 2021 annual meeting of shareholders.
Concurrent with these appointments, Ms. Sherry Aulin, Xenon’s current VP, Finance, will be appointed CFO, and Ms. Dawn Svoronos will be appointed Lead Independent Director of the Board.
“As co-founder of Xenon, I am proud of Xenon’s immense progress over the years, resulting in one of the most robust and novel neurology-focused therapeutic pipelines in our industry. I have forged a strong partnership with Ian, who has been integral to Xenon’s growth and a key strategic partner in building our company and pipeline, as well as our strong balance sheet. Xenon is in excellent shape and, as a founder and long-time CEO, this is a natural leadership transition that will allow me to focus on a strategic role while continuing to work closely with Ian and the rest of the leadership team as we execute on Xenon’s plans for the continued advancement of our pipeline programs. Also, I want to extend my deep gratitude to Michael Tarnow for his more than 20 years of service as a member of Xenon’s Board since the company’s inception. We have all benefitted immensely from Michael’s guidance, leadership, and mentorship as Board Chair.” said CEO, Dr. Simon Pimstone.
Mr. Ian Mortimer, Xenon’s President, and CFO said, “It is Simon’s vision and drive that has helped position Xenon today as a premier neuroscience company focused on developing and delivering innovative medicines to improve the health of patients with epilepsy and other neurological disorders. We have attracted top talent across our business while building a strong leadership team, and I am excited to take on this new role as we work together to advance our therapeutic programs into later-stage development.”
Dr. Pimstone and Mr. Mortimer jointly stated, “Looking ahead to 2021, we anticipate several key milestone events. Importantly, we expect a topline read-out in the third quarter from our XEN1101 Phase 2b X-TOLE study. Given its unique mechanism of action and other key pharmaceutical attributes, we believe XEN1101 has the opportunity to be an important new therapeutic choice in the adult focal epilepsy space. Also, we have now initiated our Phase 3 EPIK clinical trial studying XEN496 in pediatric patients with KCNQ2-DEE and continue to work with the KCNQ2 community to develop a therapeutic that could address this rare, pediatric disorder. By mid-year, we expect additional data from a physician-led study examining the use of XEN007 to treat childhood absence epilepsy. We also anticipate several important milestone events from our partnered programs, including the initiation of Phase 2 clinical trial with NBI-921352, related to our collaboration with Neurocrine Biosciences focused on developing treatments for epilepsy. Coming out of our partnered program with Flexion Therapeutics, we expect clinical development to start in 2021, examining the use of FX301 for the treatment of post-operative pain.”
About Xenon Pharmaceuticals Inc.
We are a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company committed to developing innovative therapeutics to improve the lives of patients with neurological disorders. We are advancing a novel product pipeline of neurology therapies to address areas of high unmet medical need, with a focus on epilepsy.
For more information: https://www.xenon-pharma.com
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