Healthcare
Biotechnology & Drugs
NASD: KOSN
Kosan Biosciences, Inc.
3832 Bay Center Place
Hayward, CA 94545
Phone: 510-732-8400
Daniel V. Santi, M.D., Ph.D.
Chairman and
Chief Executive Officer
Interview conducted by:
Walter Banks, Co-Publisher
CEOCFOinterviews,com
October 2001
BIO OF CEO,
Daniel V. Santi, M.D., Ph.D., is a co-founder, the Chairman of the Board and Chief
Executive Officer of Kosan. Dr. Santi was a Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics, and
of Pharmaceutical Chemistry, at the University of California, San Francisco, a position
that he held for over 25 years. He was one of the original members of the Scientific
Advisory Boards of Chiron Corporation and Mitotix, Inc., and has served as a consultant to
several large pharmaceutical companies. Dr. Santi has published over 275 scientific papers
and is inventor on many patents in combinatorial chemistry and other areas. Dr. Santi
received a Ph.D. in medicinal chemistry from the State University of New York and his M.D.
from the University of California, San Francisco.
About Kosan Biosciences,
Inc.
Kosan Biosciences is a biotechnology company using
proprietary technologies to develop drug candidates from an important class of natural
product compounds known as polyketides. Polyketides are naturally made in very small
amounts in microorganisms and are difficult to make or modify chemically. Kosan has
developed technologies to manipulate the natural process by which polyketides are made.
These technologies give Kosan the ability to create novel polyketides and a pipeline of
potential drug candidates.
Using Kosan’s proprietary technologies they are able to create, modify and produce
polyketides in ways that chemists cannot. They can make improved versions of a known
polyketide pharmaceutical product and are able to change a polyketide used in one
therapeutic area to create a new polyketide used for another. They can take the genetic
instructions for making a polyketide out of one microorganism and put them into another
microorganism that provides a more favorable environment to grow and produce more of the
polyketides.
Kosan has primary programs for the discovery and development of new polyketides that are
directed at infectious disease, cancer, gastrointestinal motility disorders and nerve
regeneration. These programs were selected because they represent opportunities where
Kosan’s technologies could improve existing products or advanced lead compounds. All
of their programs address existing or potential large markets.
Kosan has one compound, Epothilone D, which is nearing Phase I clinical trials.
Epothilones are polyketide natural products that inhibit cancer cells by the same
mechanism as paclitaxel, and also are effective against most paclitaxel-resistant tumors.
Epothilone D, also known as desoxyepothilone B, is in pre-clinical development by Kosan
Biosciences.
CEOCFOinterviews: Dr.
Santi, can you give us a brief history of Kosan Biosciences?
Dr Santi: Kosan was
founded in 1995, by me and Chaitan Khosla. At the time, I was a professor at the
University of California, San Francisco and Chaitan was a Professor at Stanford
University. Chaitan had developed a very powerful technology at Stanford that enabled the
manipulation of the genes of microorganisms that produced pharmaceutical natural products,
in order to change to structures of those natural products. We began our laboratory
operations in 1996, and it took about two years to establish the basics of the technology.
We then began applying it to potential pharmaceutical products.
CEOCFOinterviews: Is it
your goal to create your own drugs or enhance existing drugs?
Dr. Santi: We
do both. We have several exploratory projects seeking to discover new agents, but
primarily we use our technology to enhance the properties or activities of known drugs or
lead compounds. Our strategy is to maximize the value and reduce the risk of development
by focusing on compounds with known, validated targets and that address large and
established markets.
CEOCFOinterviews: What
are Polyketides?
Dr. Santi: Polyketides
are a class of natural products from which a lot of heavy hitter pharmaceuticals have been
derived. For example, Erythromycin, and almost all of the cholesterol lowering agents, the
statins, immunosuppressants such as FK506 and Rapamycin and a whole host of real
blockbusters in the pharmaceutical industry.
CEOCFOinterviews: Where
do they find Polyketides?
Dr. Santi: Polyketides
are generally made in soil microorganisms. For the most part the molecules that have made
it to the market are either unchanged from what nature has made or very slightly modified
by synthetic manipulation of the natural products.
CEOCFOinterviews: Where
in the developmental process of these compounds is your company?
Dr. Santi: We
are working on about 6 different Polyketides, all of which are potentially very
interesting and very useful molecules. The most advanced is a molecule called Epothilone,
which is a polyketide that has a mechanism of action that is identical to Taxol®. What
sets the Epothilones apart are that they work on Taxol® resistant tumor cells. We are
developing one of about three Epothilones that are or clinical interest. Ours is called
Epothilone D, and that molecule has been developed both at Kosan and with a collaborator
at Sloan-Kettering Institute for Cancer Research. We will be entering clinical trials in
the very near future.
We also have generated a series of
potential antibiotics in a collaboration with Johnson & Johnson for the past three
years. We are hoping that these leads will provide the next generation macrolide
antibiotic. These compounds are interesting because they are effective against
organisms that are resistant to antibiotics such as Clarithomycin® and Zithromax®. The
market for this compound is potentially greater than one billion dollars per year.
CEOCFOinterviews: What
is your commercialization strategy for the drugs that you will develop?
Dr. Santi: With
the exception of the compounds that we have been working on with Johnson & Johnson, we
intend to move Epothilone D and our other products into the clinical trials ourselves and
to partner them during the later stages of the clinical trial process. The value will
greatly increase for us if we can demonstrate efficacy.
CEOCFOinterviews: In
closing, is there anything that you would like to say to your current shareholders and
potential investor?
Dr. Santi: I think that Kosan
has a compelling profile. Kosan expects shortly to be engaged in clinical trials of
Epothilone D. We have a pipeline of potentially high value pharmaceuticals coming behind
it, and finally we have a unique and novel technology platform supporting the development
of future molecules.
