Yihong Yao Email Address

Lead Immuno Oncology Clinical Development

The Cellular Biomedicine Group develops treatments for degenerative and cancerous diseases by utilizing cell therapy technologies.

• Innovative thinker & visionary, inspiring leader with over 14 years of highly relevant experience in pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies • Proven track record of building a dynamic, interactive translational science team • Strong expertise in clinical biomarker discovery and development, strategy and personalized medicine o Delivered new knowledge in disease pathogenesis, mechanism of action of patient stratification strategies/execution (personalized medicine) for many MedImmune assets, with many now in phase 2b and phase 3 trials o Developed phase 2b and phase 3 enabling companion diagnostic for multiple programs across multiple therapeutic areas/disease indications including SLE, breast cancer, IMTC and hematology o Led the discovery and implementation of the 1st gene signature based companion diagnostic test implemented in the phase 3 trial o Lead the effort of multiple FDA, EMEA voluntary genomics data submissions (VGDS) o Consulted by the FDA on SLE biomarker development and selected by the FDA and academia/industry peers to present at the SLE biomarker consortium o Lead key collaboration with international leaders on next generation sequencing o Led the effort to build a translational science pipeline (i.e., patient stratification, disease pathogenesis) in China o Filed 25 international patents based on research from our team or collaboration with scientists internally/externally o Published over 50 manuscripts in peer-reviewed journals, many with cross functional authorships o Editors of two books on  translational strategy and personalized medicine  type I interferon involvement in autoimmune diseases o Invited speaker at numerous international biomarker, personalized medicine, rheumatology and oncology conferences o Lead the collaboration with multiple academic centers that focus on novel target identification and validation in rare/orphan diseases, and translational sciences effort in multiple therapeutic area