Trillium Therapeutics Appoints Dr. Ingmar Bruns as Chief Medical Officer

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Nov. 02, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Trillium Therapeutics Inc. (“Trillium” or the “Company”) (NASDAQ/TSX: TRIL), a clinical stage immuno-oncology company developing innovative therapies for the treatment of cancer, today announced the appointment of Ingmar Bruns, M.D., Ph.D. as Chief Medical Officer, effective immediately. Dr. Bruns will succeed Dr. Yaping Shou, who has elected to resign to pursue new opportunities. Dr. Shou will remain with the Company, in a consulting position, to assist with the transition.

“We are extremely pleased to welcome Ingmar to our management team. His strong operational and strategic leadership will be instrumental in shaping Trillium’s future clinical development strategy and execution,” said Jan Skvarka, Chief Executive Officer of Trillium. “His expertise in patient care as well as translational and clinical research positions him greatly to advance our multiple phase 2 programs expected to start next year.”

Dr. Bruns brings more than 17 years of experience in hematology and oncology as a physician and scientist. Over the past three years, Dr. Bruns served as the Senior Vice President and Head of Clinical Development at Pieris Pharmaceuticals, a clinical stage biotechnology company, where he built and led the clinical development organization. From 2013 through 2017, Dr. Bruns led clinical development of several high priority oncology assets at Bayer Pharmaceuticals. Before his industry tenure, Dr. Bruns served as an attending hematologist and oncologist as well as a physician-scientist at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, and previously the University Hospital of Dusseldorf in Germany. Dr. Bruns has authored over 50 publications in the field of hematology and oncology, including several lead authorships in high impact journals such as Nature Medicine, Blood and Leukemia. He received his M.D. and Ph.D. from the University of Lubeck in Germany.

“I am excited to join the outstanding Trillium team and look forward to contributing to the advancement of Trillium’s differentiated clinical-stage CD47-targeting programs,” said Dr. Bruns. “Trillium’s programs represent potentially transformative therapeutic options via blockade of an innate immune checkpoint for patients with hematological malignancies as well as solid tumors.”

Said Dr. Shou: “Together with the excellent Trillium team and clinical investigators, it has been my pleasure to guide development of both anti-CD47 programs during the past 2.5 years. Both compounds hold great promise for patients and I look forward to their continued successful clinical development.”