Press Release

QUANTRO Therapeutics appoints Industry Expert Dr. Michael Bauer
as Chief Executive Officer

Vienna, Austria, 04. April 2023: QUANTRO Therapeutics, an innovative drug discovery company focused on developing novel targeted therapeutics interfering with disease-causing transcriptional programs in cancer, today announced the appointment of Dr. Michael Bauer as Chief Executive Officer (CEO), effective May 1, 2023. He will succeed Dr. Dieter Nachtigall who has been CEO since QUANTRO’s inception and will transition to an advisory role for the company.

Dr. Michael Bauer is an experienced biotech entrepreneur and executive with a proven track record as CEO, Board membership, and other senior R&D leadership roles in the life sciences industry. Having worked in global corporations, mid-size and small biotech companies, his focus is advancing innovative, first-in-class cancer therapeutics, including transcription factor targeting drugs, into clinical development. While most projects have reached clinical proof of concept, some have advanced to Phase 3 clinical trials and reached approval.

Prior to joining QUANTRO, Dr. Bauer was Co-founder, CEO and a member of the Board of Directors at Cellestia Biotech AG (Basel, Switzerland), where he led the company from an early-stage academic spin-off into a pioneering oncology R&D company, closely integrating drug discovery, development and diagnostic approaches for patient selection and response tracking. Beyond advancing a novel protein-protein interaction (PPI) inhibitor of the NOTCH transcriptional activation complex into a successful Phase 2 clinical program in oncology and autoimmune/inflammatory diseases, he led the company in building an innovative discovery pipeline for small-molecule inhibitors targeting so-far undruggable transcription factor targets in cancer. During his tenure he raised significant funds from a global shareholder base in the EU, USA and Asia. In his earlier career, he held management roles of increasing responsibility, gaining years of experience in leading global development projects, covering the full range of development, from preclinical research to clinical development, including IND and NDA submissions. Dr. Bauer holds a Ph.D. in Biotechnology and an M.Sc. in Chemistry.

Dr. Elmar Maier, Chairman of the QUANTRO Advisory Board, said: “It is a true pleasure to welcome Michael as the new CEO of QUANTRO. He is a very experienced biotech entrepreneur and executive, highly regarded for his industry and strategic expertise, leadership skills, and significant know-how when it comes to company building, biotech financing and the successful transition of transcription factor inhibitors into clinical development.” Dr. Maier continued: “We are very grateful for Dieter’s successful and highly committed leadership during QUANTRO’s seed phase and thank him very much for his continued support during the current transition process.”

Dr. Dieter Nachtigall, current Chief Executive Officer of QUANTRO, said: “I would like to sincerely thank the outstanding QUANTRO team, QUANTRO’s Founders, the board and investors for their trust, collaboration and support. I wish them and Michael as QUANTRO’s new CEO much success in further developing our highly innovative programs towards the clinic and am very happy to stay on board in a new advisory role.”

Dr. Michael Bauer, designated Chief Executive Officer of QUANTRO, said: “I am delighted to join QUANTRO and lead the company during these exciting times. QUANTRO has established a unique discovery platform, based on an unprecedented deep understanding of gene transcription prior to and during therapeutic interventions. This approach will allow the company to build a proprietary pipeline of first-in-class transcription factor targeting drugs, as well as identifying and characterizing new, currently unexploited targets for unmet medical needs in cancer therapy and beyond. Exploiting this capacity of its proprietary discovery platform, QUANTRO has the potential to reshape today´s therapeutic landscape bringing innovative first-in-class therapies to patients. I am thrilled to be part of this journey.”
 

About QUANTRO Therapeutics GmbH
QUANTRO Therapeutics (“QUANTRO”) is an innovative drug discovery company focused on developing novel targeted therapeutics interfering with disease-causing transcriptional programs in cancer. QUANTRO has combined functional-genetics, time-resolved RNA sequencing and comparative transcriptomics in its innovative QUANTROseq drug discovery platform, thereby transforming the precision and scope of cell-based compound screens. QUANTRO was founded in 2019 as a spin-off of the IMP and the IMBA in Vienna, Austria. The Company attracted Boehringer Ingelheim Venture Fund and Evotec as seed investors. In 2022, QUANTRO entered a three-year collaboration, option and license agreement with Boehringer Ingelheim to identify and develop drug candidates targeting transcriptional regulators.
 

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