BOSTON — Infinitopes has appointed Jo Brewer, PhD, as chief scientific officer and interim chief operating officer as the biotechnology company advances its precision immunotherapy pipeline through clinical development.
The company, which is developing novel cancer immunotherapies, said Brewer will join its executive leadership team after serving as a non-executive director since March 2025. Her appointment comes as Infinitopes works to expand its AI and machine learning-powered antigen discovery platform into a therapeutic pipeline.
Infinitopes is advancing ITOP1, its lead precision therapeutic vaccine, in the VISTA trial, a first-in-human, double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled phase 1/2a study. The vaccine is designed to prevent recurrence of esophageal cancer in the first-line neoadjuvant setting, where the company said significant unmet need remains.
ITOP1 is an off-the-shelf cancer vaccine using Infinitopes’ proprietary vector technology to induce T-cell responses in patients with surgically resectable esophageal adenocarcinoma.
Brewer joins Infinitopes from Adaptimmune, where she was a founding scientist and served as chief scientific officer. Infinitopes said she played a key role in the development of Tecelra, the first engineered TCR-T cell therapy for solid tumors to reach the market.
“This is a really exciting moment in Infinitopes’ innovation journey, where cutting-edge science transitions from lab into the clinical realm. I have always been passionate about shepherding science from ‘bench-to-bedside’ and am excited by the ITOP1 product development programme and its potential to revolutionise first line treatment for those living with cancer.
“I am thrilled to join at this critical clinical stage in the company’s development. I’ll be tapping into the full breadth and depth of my experience to build on the critical work of the co-founders Jonathan Kwok, Senthil Chinnakannan and Lian Ni Lee, helping them to drive their vision to the next level.”
Dan Menichella, a biotech executive who recently became interim CEO after serving as a non-executive director, said Brewer brings experience moving therapies from concept to market and scaling biotech organizations.
“Not only does Jo have hands-on experience successfully transitioning a candidate from concept to market, but she’s also adept at steering growth in scaling organisations in a sustainable way. We’re delighted to have her join us on a permanent basis at this point in our innovation journey.”
The leadership changes will allow co-founding CEO Dr Jonathan Kwok to become president and chief medical officer. In that role, he will focus on company strategy, clinical development, execution of the VISTA trial and AI business technologies.
Infinitopes said it extended its seed financing round in January, raising an additional $15.4 million and bringing the total raised to $35.1 million.
Brewer has more than 20 years of experience in cancer immunotherapy and cell therapies. At Adaptimmune, she helped develop cell-based immunotherapies and contributed to partnerships with Genentech, Galapagos, Astellas and GSK. She also helped scale the company from a small biotech to more than 500 employees.
