SAN FRANCISCO–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Vaxart, Inc., a biotechnology company focused on the development of oral vaccines, announced that Robert Fildes, PhD, has been appointed to the board of directors.

“We’re very pleased that Bob has come on board,” said Mark Backer, PhD, the company’s CEO. “His operational experience and track record in growing biotech companies will be an incredible asset as we prepare to move our first product into the clinic.”

Fildes has had a long and illustrious career in the biotech industry. In the early 1980s, he was a founder and president of Biogen Inc. He then went on to become CEO of Cetus Corp., where he built the company into a leader in PCR and brought IL-2 to market as a treatment for renal cell cancer. Fildes is currently president of SB2, a biotechnology licensing company. He holds a PhD in biochemical genetics from the University of London.

“I’m intrigued by what I see at Vaxart,” Dr. Fildes noted. “I’ve been around the industry a long time and have seen many breakthrough approaches. I believe that Vaxart’s platform could be such an advance, one that can fundamentally change the landscape of vaccine development.”

In addition to Vaxart, Fildes is a director of La Jolla Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: LJPC), and is chairman of Inimex and Twinstrand Therapeutics, private Canadian biotech companies.

About Vaxart (www.vaxart.com)

Vaxart is a privately held biotechnology company focused on the development of oral vaccines. Vaxart has developed a unique platform approach that permits modular creation of vaccines, enabling the company to efficiently produce a portfolio of products with low development risk. Vaxart intends to create oral alternatives to current vaccines and can also apply its platform to develop first-in-class vaccines for new indications. Vaxart’s lead programs are a vaccine for avian flu, which the company expects to enter clinical testing in 2009, and a vaccine for annual flu that is in early-stage development.

– BusinessWire

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