GAITHERSBURG, Md., Sept. 13, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Altimmune, Inc., a clinical stage immunotherapeutic company, today announced that Christine Brennan, PhD, Principal at Novartis Venture Fund, has joined its Board of Directors effective immediately. Dr. Brennan replaces Florent Gros from Novartis Venture Fund.

“We are extremely pleased to welcome Dr. Brennan to our Board. She has an impressive background in the biopharmaceutical industry, and her experience and guidance will be invaluable as we continue to advance the clinical development of our three drug candidates,” said Bill Enright, President and Chief Executive Officer of Altimmune. “We would also like to thank Mr. Gros for his service to Altimmune over the past year.”

Prior to joining the Novartis Venture Fund in November 2013, Dr. Brennan was Chief Business Officer of Vitae Pharmaceuticals and spent five years at Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research in Strategic Alliances, most recently as Executive Director and Head of Strategy & Operations. Prior to Novartis, she held positions in business development and marketing at EnVivo Pharmaceuticals (now FORUM Pharmaceuticals), Biovail (now Valeant Pharmaceuticals) and Cogent Neuroscience. Previously in her career, she was also a Director at Fidelity Biosciences Group (now F-Prime Capital Partners). Dr. Brennan received her Ph.D. in Neuroscience from Dartmouth Medical School and completed an NIH postdoctoral fellowship.

About Altimmune

Altimmune is a clinical stage immunotherapeutic company focused on the development of products to stimulate robust and durable immune responses for the prevention and treatment of disease. The Company has two proprietary platform technologies, RespirVec and Densigen, each of which has been shown to activate the immune system in distinctly different ways than traditional vaccines. Using these technologies, Altimmune has developed three novel clinical stage product candidates that potentially represent an entirely new approach to harnessing the immune system.