Published:
Bioheart, Inc., Board Appoints Howard J. Leonhardt Chief Executive Officer
SUNRISE, Fla., July 3 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Bioheart, Inc.,
(Nasdaq: BHRT) a biotechnology company that is focused on the development of
autologous (patient-derived) cell therapies and devices for the treatment of
chronic and acute heart damage, today announced that its Board of Directors
appointed Howard J. Leonhardt, Bioheart's co-founder, Chairman of the Board
and Chief Technology Officer, to serve as Chief Executive Officer effective as
of July 1, 2008. This follows the resignation of William M. Pinon as the
Company's President and CEO and as a member of the Board of Directors as of
the same date. Pinon has agreed to remain with the Company through July 25,
2008 to assist in the executive transition process.
"Bill has been a tremendous asset to Bioheart during his tenure and we are
sorry to see him leave in order to pursue other interests," said Leonhardt.
"Under his leadership, Bioheart became a publicly traded company and advanced
the base of clinical evidence regarding our MyoCell(R) clinical cell therapy,
including initiation of our potentially pivotal Phase II/III MARVEL Trial in
the US andEurope. I look forward to a greater level of involvement as we
continue to pursue regulatory approval and commercialization of this therapy
to treat congestive heart failure patients, as well as, drive the development
of future generation products. We look to the future with great anticipation."
ABOUT BIOHEART
Bioheart, Inc. (NASDAQ: BHRT) is a biotechnology company focused on the
discovery, development and, subject to regulatory approval, commercialization
of autologous cell therapies for the treatment of chronic and acute heart
damage. Its lead product candidate, MyoCell(R), is an innovative clinical
cell therapy designed to populate regions of scar tissue within a patient's
heart with new living cells for the purpose of improving cardiac function in
chronic heart failure patients. The Company's pipeline includes multiple
product candidates for the treatment of heart damage, including Bioheart Acute
Cell Therapy, an autologous, adipose cell treatment for acute heart damage,
and MyoCell(R) SDF-1, a therapy utilizing autologous cells that are
genetically modified to express additional potentially therapeutic growth
proteins. For more information on Bioheart, visit http://www.bioheartinc.com.
MyoCell and MyoCell SDF-1 are trademarks of Bioheart, Inc.
Forward Looking Statements:
Except for historical matters contained herein, statements made in this
press release are forward-looking and are made pursuant to the safe harbor
provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Without
limiting the generality of the foregoing, words such as "may", "will", "to",
"plan", "expect", "believe", "anticipate", "intend", "could", "would",
"estimate", or "continue" or the negative other variations thereof or
comparable terminology are intended to identify forward-looking statements.
Investors and others are cautioned that a variety of factors, including
certain risks, may affect our business and cause actual results to differ
materially from those set forth in the forward-looking statements. These risk
factors include, without limitation, (i) our ability to secure additional
financing; (ii) the timely success and completion of our clinical trials;
(iii) the occurrence of any unacceptable side effects during or after
preclinical and clinical testing of our product candidates; (iv) regulatory
approval of our product candidates; (v) our dependence on the success of our
lead product candidate; (vi) our inability to predict the extent of our future
losses or if or when we will become profitable; (vii) our ability to protect
our intellectual property rights; (viii) our inability to predict the extent
of our future losses or if or when we will become profitable; and (viii)
intense competition . The company is also subject to the risks and
uncertainties described in its filings with the Securities and Exchange
Commission, including the section titled "Risk Factors" in its Annual Report
on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2007, as amended by Amendment No.
1 on Form 10-K/A.
Contact: Lytham Partners, LLC The Storch-Murphy Group
Joe Diaz Martin Schildhouse
Joe Dorame Communications Director
Robert Blum (305) 606-3577
(602) 889-9700
SOURCE Bioheart, Inc.
Copyright © 2008, PRNewswire
Copyright © 2008, NewsBlaze,
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Tags: Healthcare, Pharmaceuticals, Biotechnology, Health, , florida
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