SwanBio is now part of Spur Therapeutics.

PHILADELPHIA, PA, January 6, 2021 (BUSINESS WIRE)

SwanBio Therapeutics (SwanBio), a gene therapy company advancing AAV-based therapies for the treatment of devastating, genetically defined neurological conditions, today announced that Scott McMillan, Ph.D., has been appointed Chief Technical Officer. Dr. McMillan is a seasoned life sciences executive with more than 25 years of experience in quality, process development, scale-up and technology transfer from research to commercial scale.

“We are delighted to welcome Scott to the SwanBio team, and to gain access to his development leadership and deep technical expertise in gene therapy,” said Tom Anderson, Chief Executive Officer of SwanBio. “Rebecca Dabora, who has led the technical operations functions as interim CTO, has done an excellent job preparing us for clinical studies, and we are thankful for her contributions. Today, we stand in a commercial-ready position for our lead program in adrenomyeloneuropathy, and we are excited to tap into Scott’s wealth of knowledge and experience, which will greatly benefit SwanBio and the advancement of our growing portfolio.”

“Gene therapy is a very promising field that has the potential to meaningfully impact millions of patients around the world, and SwanBio’s novel AAV-based approach could be a game changer for the treatment of CNS disorders,” said Dr. McMillan. “I’m excited to join this highly innovative company at such a pivotal time in its evolution and look forward to partnering with the team to advance our programs through clinical development and to patients in need.”

Dr. McMillan has had an extensive and successful career leading technical functions across a variety of biotechnology companies and therapeutic areas. He joins SwanBio from Saliogen Therapeutics, a start-up next-generation gene therapy company, where he served as President and Chief Executive Officer. Before that, he served as Chief Operating Officer of uniQure, Inc., where he was responsible for all GMP relevant activities including, manufacturing, quality assurance, quality control, supply chain, technical services and facility management. Prior to that, Dr. McMillan held technical operations and manufacturing roles of increasing responsibility at AMAG Pharmaceuticals, AVANT Immunotherapeutics Inc, Johnson Matthey Pharmaceutical Materials Inc., Artisan Industries Inc., LIST Inc. and Herzog Hart Corp. Dr. McMillan began his career in academia, serving as an assistant professor of chemical engineering at Northeastern University. He currently serves as a business mentor and on the Industrial Advisory Board within the Department of Chemical Engineering at Northeastern. Dr. McMillan holds a Ph.D. in chemical engineering from Georgia Institute of Technology and an M.S. in economics and a B.S. in chemical engineering from the University of Delaware.