EpiTan names ex-CSL czar as director

Melbourne-based EpiTan has appointed ex-CSL general manager Stanley McLiesh as a non-executive director.

"We're very happy to have him on our board. He's got a great background," said EpiTan CEO Dr Wayne Millen. He said McLiesh, who has recently acted as a consultant to the company, brought with him a lot of experience in commercialisation of pharmaceutical products, especially in the area of licensing and collaborative agreements.

"His extensive experience will complement that of EpiTan's current board and will be instrumental in taking EpiTan forward to its next stages of development as our Melanotan project moves towards maturity," Millen said.

McLiesh was at CSL for 25 years and helped the company move from government ownership to becoming one of Australia's most successful biopharmaceutical companies.

He replaces Malcolm McComas, who resigned from the EpiTan board in June to pursue other business commitments.

Annual report

EpiTan released its financial results for the 2001-2002 financial year last week, posting a loss of $3.14 million.

"We didn't spend as much as we expected, because one of our clinical trials programs didn't start as early as we expected," Millen said. "We had a loss of $3.14 million, but we only spent about $2.5 million in cash."

The company has about $4.5 million in cash reserves.

Millen said the company was expecting to spend more this year as it moved into Phase II trials for its lead drug Melanotan, but declined to put a figure on it at this point, pending the release of the company's annual report.

"We're moving towards a stage of sophistication [in the drug development process] which would demand increased expenditure," he explained.

Millen said that due to the nature of Melanotan, which is a preventative rather than a therapeutic product, clinical trial recruitment was faster and cost less, and the trials themselves were less expensive too. "That's a real advantage to us," he said.