PLYMOUTH MEETING, Pa., Dec. 11, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Inovio Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:INO) has promoted Dr. Laurent Humeau to Senior Vice President, Research & Development, reporting to Dr. J. Joseph Kim, Inovio’s President & CEO. Dr. Humeau joined Inovio in 2014 as Vice President, R&D.

Dr. Humeau will serve an integral role in advancing Inovio's portfolio of ASPIRE™ (Antigen SPecific Immune REsponses) immunotherapies and vaccines covering multiple therapeutic cancers and infections, supporting clinical study opportunities, and fostering collaborations with academic partners. He will provide the technical and strategic leadership for Inovio’s highly productive R&D group whose activities include: preclinical development of immunotherapy and vaccine candidates, immunology and immune monitoring approaches, method development, product characterization, and analytical development. Under Dr. Humeau’s leadership in last 4 years, Inovio’s R&D group along with its collaborators published more than 50 peer-reviewed pre-clinical and clinical publications and dozens of new patent filings as well as receiving over $70 million in non-dilutive grants and contracts from DARPA, NIH, and the Gates Foundation in support of Inovio’s platform and vaccine development.

Dr. J. Joseph Kim, President and CEO, said, “As the chief scientist at Inovio, Laurent’s scientific expertise and his track record of executing our strategic plan make him well-deserving of this expanded role. Since he joined Inovio, he has strengthened our R&D discovery and development engine that is the foundation of our new products and academic collaborations.”

Prior to Inovio, Dr. Humeau served as a top R&D leader for several companies, including Chief Scientific Officer at VIRxSYS Corporation and Senior Director of Translational Research, Human Therapeutics Division for Intrexon. Dr. Humeau received his BS and MS in biology from the University Pierre & Marie Curie, Paris and a PhD in blood cell biology from the University Denis Diderot.

About Inovio Pharmaceuticals, Inc.

Inovio is taking immunotherapy to the next level in the fight against cancer and infectious diseases. We are the only immunotherapy company that has reported generating T cells in vivo in high quantity that are fully functional and whose killing capacity correlates with relevant clinical outcomes with a favorable safety profile. With an expanding portfolio of immune therapies, the company is advancing a growing preclinical and clinical stage product pipeline. Partners and collaborators include MedImmune, Regeneron, Genentech, The Wistar Institute, University of Pennsylvania, DARPA, GeneOne Life Science, Plumbline Life Sciences, ApolloBio Corporation, Drexel University, NIH, HIV Vaccines Trial Network, National Cancer Institute, U.S. Military HIV Research Program, and Laval University. For more information, visit www.inovio.com.