Legend Biotech Corp. on Friday said it appointed Guowei Fang as senior vice president, global head of research and early development.
Fang will assume the responsibilities of Frank Fan, who resigned from the company effective March 30.
Based in Somerset, Legend is a global biotechnology company developing, manufacturing and commercializing novel therapies to treat life-threatening diseases. Fang, an accomplished scientist and pharmaceutical research and development leader, will be responsible for advancing the company’s multiple pipeline agents for hematologic and solid cancers and steering R&D in the U.S., Ireland and China.
Fang comes to Legend Biotech from Zymeworks Inc., where he served as senior vice president of research and oversaw the development of novel platforms and a portfolio of multifunctional biologics and antibody drug conjugates.
Prior to that, Fang led discovery and early development initiatives as head of discovery at Pharmacyclics, an AbbVie company. In that role, he built the Research, Discovery, Translation and Clinical Pharmacology organizations; delivered a broad pipeline of hematological assets; and supported the clinical development of Imbruvica.
“We are delighted to welcome Dr. Guowei Fang. We are confident that he will lead our R&D teams toward success and help them to make significant breakthroughs in the field of cell therapy,” Ying Huang, CEO and chief financial officer, said.
Fang received his postdoctoral training in cell biology and cancer biology from Harvard Medical School and holds a Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Colorado–Boulder in biochemistry, cell biology and cancer biology. Before he transitioned into the pharmaceutical industry, Fang was a faculty member at Stanford University, where he led initiatives in cancer research.
