Jeff Galvin - Programming a HIV Functional Cure

Jeff Galvin is the CEO & Founder of American Gene Technologies (AGT), a clinical-stage biotech company with a proprietary gene-delivery platform for rapid development of cell and gene therapies to cure infectious diseases, cancers, and inherited disorders. He earned his BA degree in Economics from Harvard in 1981 and accumulated more than 30 years of business and entrepreneurial experience while founding and leading a variety of Silicon Valley startups. As a retired angel investor, Mr. Galvin funded and founded AGT after meeting with Dr. Roscoe Brady, a research scientist at NIH-NINDS who is best known for developing the first ever enzyme replacement therapy called Alglucerase that treats Gaucher disease and is marketed by Sanofi Genzyme. In this episode, we discuss how the company initially came together, the science behind AGT’s gene & cell therapy platform, and the rationale behind their lead drug candidate - a first-in-class, genetically modified T-cell therapy developed as a functional cure for HIV, which entered first-in-human Phase 1 clinical trials in November 2020 (AGT press release, Molecular Therapy paper). Mr. Galvin also shares his unique perspective about how the principles that drove the success of the computer & software industries are starting to bleed into the biotech industry, making drug development more fruitful and cost effective.Hosted by Joe Varriale and Roshan Chikarmane.