GARDEN CITY, N.Y. and REHOVOT, Israel, Feb. 11, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- AIT Therapeutics, Inc. (OTCQB: AITB), a clinical-stage medical device and biopharmaceutical company focused on developing inhaled Nitric Oxide (NO) for the treatment of patients with respiratory conditions including serious lung infections and pulmonary hypertension, today announced the appointment of Robert F. Carey to the Company’s Board of Directors.
“Bob is a seasoned healthcare executive and investment banking veteran with an impeccable track record and we are elated that he is joining the Board,” said Steve Lisi, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of AIT. “His experience as the chief business officer at Horizon Pharma plc over the last five years and as an investment banker for more than two decades will be invaluable to the Board and our management team as AIT forges ahead with a planned launch in the United States of our AirNOvent* system with our commercial partner Circassia Pharmaceuticals, a pivotal study in bronchiolitis anticipated to read out in the second quarter of 2020, and an at-home pilot study in nontuberculous mycobacteria expected to commence by year-end 2019.”
“I am excited to join the impressive Board of AIT, a very well-managed company with a truly revolutionary product,” said Mr. Carey. “The cylinder free nitric oxide generator and delivery system is a highly innovative and disruptive medical device that will make nitric oxide more accessible to patients in a larger number of hospitals in the United States and other countries around the world, as well as make nitric oxide potentially available to infants suffering from bronchiolitis and to patients in the home-setting with severe lung infections. I believe AIT has something very unique and I look forward to sharing my insight with the Board and management team.”
Mr. Carey has an extensive track record of accomplishment within the healthcare investment banking industry. He has assisted biotech and specialty pharma companies raise more than $10 billion in initial public offerings, follow-on offerings, debt offerings, and private placements. He has served as a financial advisor on mergers, acquisitions, and strategic alliance transactions with a total deal value of more than $10 billion. Mr. Carey has served as executive vice president and chief business officer at Horizon Pharma since 2014, during which Horizon Pharma deployed in excess of $3 billion to acquire or license eight commercial products and three products in development and grew net sales from $74 million in 2013 to approximately $1.2 billion* in 2018, a compound annual growth rate of 75%. Before Horizon, he spent more than 11 years as managing director and head of the life sciences investment banking group at JMP Securities. Mr. Carey was a managing director in the healthcare groups at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein and Vector Securities for a total of 14 years. He received his B.B.A. in Accounting from the University of Notre Dame. Mr. Carey currently serves on the board of Sangamo Therapeutics, Inc.
*FactSet
About AIT
AIT Therapeutics Inc. is a clinical-stage medical device and biopharmaceutical company using nitric oxide (NO) to treat respiratory and other diseases. The Company is currently applying its therapeutic expertise to treat lower respiratory tract infections that are not effectively addressed with current standards of care, as well as pulmonary hypertension, in various settings. AIT Therapeutics is currently advancing its revolutionary NO Generator and Delivery System in clinical trials for the treatment of bronchiolitis and nontuberculous mycobacteria (NTM). For more information, visit www.AIT-Pharm.com.
About NO
Nitric oxide (NO) is a crucially important molecule proven to play a critical role in a broad array of biological functions. Inhaled nitric oxide is currently approved for treating term and near-term neonates with Persistent Pulmonary Hypertension of the Newborn (PPHN) in the United States of America and most major markets. In Europe, Japan and Australia, inhaled NO is approved to treat PPHN as well as pulmonary hypertension during the peri-operative cardiac surgery period in neonates, children, and adults. In the airways, NO is believed to play a key role in the innate immune system at concentrations of approximately 200 ppm. In vitro studies suggest that NO possesses anti-microbial activity not only against common bacteria, both gram-positive and gram-negative, but also against other diverse organisms including mycobacteria, fungi, yeast and parasites, and has the potential to eliminate their multi-drug resistant strains.
About PPHN
Persistent pulmonary hypertension of the newborn (PPHN) is a life-threatening condition secondary to failure of normal circulatory transition at birth. It is a syndrome characterized by elevated pulmonary vascular resistance (PVR) that causes labile hypoxemia due to decreased pulmonary blood flow and right-to-left shunting of blood. Its incidence has been reported as 1.9 per 1000 live births (0.4–6.8/1000 live births) with mortality rate ranging between 4–33%. This syndrome complicates the course of about 10% of infants with respiratory failure and remains a source of considerable morbidity and mortality. NO gas is a pulmonary vasodilator and is approved in dozens of countries to improve oxygenation and reduce the need for extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) in term and near-term (>34 weeks gestation) neonates with hypoxic respiratory failure associated with clinical or echocardiographic evidence of pulmonary hypertension in conjunction with ventilator support and other appropriate agents.
About AirNOvent*
AIT’s ventilator compatible NO Generator and Delivery System is a cylinder free, phasic flow nitric oxide delivery system and has been designated as a medical device by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The device can generate NO on demand for delivery to the lungs at concentrations ranging from 1 part per million (ppm) to 80 ppm. The elimination of the need for large, high-pressure cylinders for NO is a significant advantage in the hospital setting by greatly reducing inventory and storage requirements and improving overall safety with the elimination of NO2 purging steps, among other benefits.
*AirNOvent is not an approved name for the product and may not be the final name submitted for approval.
About Bronchiolitis
The majority of hospital admissions of infants with bronchiolitis are caused by respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). RSV is a common and highly transmissible virus that infects the respiratory tract of most children before their second birthday. While most infants with RSV present with minor respiratory symptoms, a small percentage develop serious lower airway infections, termed bronchiolitis, which can become life-threatening. The absence of treatment options for bronchiolitis limits the care of these sick infants to largely supportive measures. AIT’s system is designed to effectively deliver 160 ppm NO, which has been proven to eliminate bacteria, viruses, fungi and other microbes from the lungs.
About NTM
Nontuberculous mycobacteria (NTM) infection is a rare and serious condition causing debilitating pulmonary disease associated with increased morbidity and mortality. NTM is an emerging public health concern worldwide because of its multi-drug antibiotic resistance. Current treatment guidelines suggest a combination of multiple antibiotics delivered continually for as long as two years. These complex, expensive and invasive regimens have a poor record in the treatment of mycobacterium abscessus complex (MABSC) and refractory mycobacterium avium complex (MAC). AIT’s system is designed to effectively deliver 160 - 400 ppm NO to the lung. This range of NO concentration has been demonstrated to eliminate bacteria, viruses, fungi and other microbes from the lungs and may work against antibiotic resistant bacteria.
Forward-Looking Statement
This press release contains “forward-looking statements.” Forward-looking statements include statements about our expectations, beliefs, or intentions regarding our product offerings, business, financial condition, results of operations, strategies or prospects. You can identify such forward-looking statements by the words “expects,” “intends,” “plans,” “projects,” “believes,” “estimates,” “likely,” “goal,” “assumes,” “targets” and similar expressions and/or the use of future tense or conditional constructions (such as “will,” “may,” “could,” “should” and the like) and by the fact that these statements do not relate strictly to historical or current matters. Rather, forward-looking statements relate to anticipated or expected events, activities, trends or results as of the date they are made. Because forward-looking statements relate to matters that have not yet occurred, these statements are inherently subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual results to differ materially from any future results expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are only predictions and reflect our views as of the date they are made with respect to future events and financial performance. Many factors could cause our actual activities or results to differ materially from the activities and results anticipated in forward-looking statements, including risks related to: our approach to discover and develop novel drugs, which is unproven and may never lead to marketable products; our ability to fund and the results of further pre-clinical and clinical trials; obtaining, maintaining and protecting intellectual property utilized by our products; our ability to enforce our patents against infringers and to defend our patent portfolio against challenges from third parties; our ability to obtain additional funding to support our business activities; our dependence on third parties for development, manufacture, marketing, sales, and distribution of products; the successful development of our product candidates, all of which are in early stages of development; obtaining regulatory approval for products; competition from others using technology similar to ours and others developing products for similar uses; our dependence on collaborators; and our short operating history. We undertake no obligation to update, and we do not have a policy of updating or revising, these forward-looking statements, except as required by applicable law.
CONTACT
Steven Lisi, Chief Executive Officer
AIT Therapeutics, Inc.
Steve@AIT-Pharm.com
Bob Yedid
LifeSci Advisors, LLC
Bob@LifeSciAdvisors.com
(646) 597-6989