EMERYVILLE, Calif., Sept. 12, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- 4D Molecular Therapeutics (Nasdaq: FDMT, 4DMT or the Company), a clinical-stage biotherapeutics company harnessing the power of directed evolution for targeted genetic medicines, today announced the appointment of Uneek Mehra as Chief Financial & Business Officer of 4DMT. Mr. Mehra will succeed August J. Moretti, J.D., who is retiring, and has agreed to serve in an advisory capacity to support Mr. Mehra’s transition. Mr. Mehra will lead 4DMT’s finance, business development, and precommercial functions and will be a member of 4DMT’s Executive Team, reporting to David Kirn, M.D., Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of 4DMT.

Mr. Mehra brings over 27 years of extensive leadership experience including financial, commercial, corporate strategy, and business development expertise supporting multi-billion dollar commercial-stage businesses, in addition to deep experience successfully growing and scaling emerging companies. He previously served as a senior executive at Novartis for 13 years and as CFO & CBO of publicly traded companies, including most recently Myovant Sciences Ltd., which was recently acquired (all remaining shares not already owned) by Sumitovant Biopharma for $1.7 billion.

“We are thrilled to welcome Uneek to 4DMT at an important inflection point in our company progress towards pivotal trials across multiple programs,” said David Kirn, M.D., Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of 4DMT. “Uneek brings valuable skillsets to 4DMT with his extensive experience and track record in biopharmaceutical finance, strategy, and transactions. His appointment reflects our commitment to unlocking the full potential of our Therapeutic Vector Evolution platform, and he will play a major role in our goal to become a fully integrated large market genetic medicines company. We thank August Moretti for his many outstanding contributions to the company over the past five years. He has helped lead the Company through multiple private and public capital raises, including our IPO in 2020, raising a total of $600 million of capital, and has been a valued member of our Executive Team.”

Mr. Mehra joins 4DMT from Myovant Sciences Ltd., a public biopharma company, where, as Chief Financial and Business Officer, he successfully built partnerships, and enabled significant commercial growth for its products in Oncology and Women’s Health. Prior to joining Myovant, Mr. Mehra was Chief Financial Officer and Corporate Treasurer at PACT Pharma, a personalized cell therapy company targeting solid cancers, where he successfully built partnerships and raised capital to scale the emerging company. Previously, Mr. Mehra was Chief Financial Officer at Proteus Digital Health, a digital medicines company, with responsibility for Finance, Tax, Treasury, IT, Facilities, and Human Resources.

Mr. Mehra also spent more than 13 years at Novartis where he drove strategic investments and commercial financial performance for multi-billion-dollar businesses. He successfully led strategic portfolio prioritization and resource allocation across several business units and steered successful transactions across oncology and specialty pharma assets. As Chief Financial Officer of the US Integrated Care and Critical Care Business Units, Mr. Mehra supported commercial excellence across multiple products; notably, driving the launch and execution of Cosentyx^® and Entresto^®. Earlier in his career, Mr. Mehra held senior finance roles with International Business Machines (IBM) Corporation and Citibank. Mr. Mehra obtained his MBA in Strategy and Leadership from the International Institute for Management Development, Lausanne, Switzerland; MS in Finance from the University of Mumbai, India; and Bachelor of Engineering in Electronics from the Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani, India.

“I’m honored to join 4DMT at this pivotal stage of growth for the Company. I look forward to enabling the rapid acceleration of next generation genetic medicines which are differentiated and address multiple large-market opportunities,” said Mr. Mehra. “4DMT's pioneering technology platform with enhanced specificity, its culture of innovation and its experienced leadership team provide a unique opportunity to deliver potentially curative therapies to patients.”

About 4DMT 

4DMT is a clinical-stage biotherapeutics company harnessing the power of directed evolution for genetic medicines targeting large market diseases. 4DMT seeks to unlock the full potential of genetic medicines using its proprietary invention platform, Therapeutic Vector Evolution, which combines the power of the Nobel Prize-winning technology, directed evolution, with approximately one billion synthetic AAV capsid-derived sequences to invent customized and evolved vectors for use in our product candidates. All of our vectors are proprietary to 4DMT and were invented at 4DMT, including the vectors utilized in our clinical-stage and preclinical pipeline product candidates: R100, A101, and C102. The Company is initially focused on five clinical-stage product candidates in three therapeutic areas for both rare and large market diseases: ophthalmology, pulmonology, and cardiology. The 4DMT customized and evolved vectors were invented with the goal of being delivered at relatively low doses through clinically routine, well-tolerated, and minimally invasive routes of administration, transducing diseased cells in target tissues efficiently, having reduced immunogenicity and, where relevant, having resistance to pre-existing antibodies. 4DMT is currently advancing five product candidates in clinical development: 4D-150 for wet AMD and DME, 4D-710 for cystic fibrosis lung disease, 4D-310 for Fabry disease cardiomyopathy, 4D-125 for XLRP, and 4D-110 for choroideremia. The 4D preclinical product candidates in development are: 4D-175 for geographic atrophy and 4D-725 for AATLD. 

4D-150, 4D-710, 4D-310, 4D-125, and 4D-110 are our product candidates in clinical development and have not yet been approved for marketing by the US FDA or any other regulatory authority. No representation is made as to the safety or effectiveness of 4D-150, 4D-710, 4D-310, 4D-125, or 4D-110 for the therapeutic uses for which they are being studied. 

4D Molecular Therapeutics™, 4DMT™, Therapeutic Vector Evolution™, and the 4DMT logo are trademarks of 4DMT. 

Contacts:

Media:

Katherine Smith
Evoke Canale
Katherine.Smith@evokegroup.com

Investors:

Julian Pei
Head of Investor Relations and Corporate Communications
Investor.Relations@4DMT.com
267-644-5097