Brian Frenzel is an experienced life science entrepreneur and private investor based in Los Altos, California. He holds an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business and an undergraduate degree from the same institution. Brian Frenzel is the CEO of Tosk, Inc., a biopharmaceutical company that focuses on developing new drugs for cancer and other diseases.
Recent research using fruit flies has begun to unravel new insights into potential cancer treatments. Although these insects have been used as an important biology research tool for over a century. their role in drug discovery is a recent development. For example, fruit flies can help researchers to study what exactly causes death in cancer patients. Researchers implant human non-metastatic tumors, which are tumors that do not spread to other parts of the body, into fruit flies and monitor their systemic effects. They look for the activities of the tumor that cause the animals to die quickly. Fruit flies are effective for research because scientists can monitor them up to the moment of death. And they are much less expensive than using other more traditional cancer models in rodents. Understanding the mechanism of action of the tumor genes helps researchers to find new therapies to block the activity of the cancer genes. At Tosk, scientists have discovered and perfected ways to integrate human cancer genes into the genome of flies in such a way that candidate compounds can be screened for their ability to block the activity of these genes. Such screens have the advantage of identifying compounds which are also safe, since toxic compounds would kill the flies. The hits in these screens are now being optimized for their potential as direct treatments for the cancers that are driven by the target genes.
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An experienced investor and life science entrepreneur, Brian Frenzel is currently the president and chief executive officer of Tosk, Inc., a clinical stage pharmaceutical discovery and development company. Brian Frenzel also serves as a senior advisor and former member of the board at SanBio, Ltd., a clinical stage cell therapy company developing new drugs for neurogenerative conditions such as cerebral stroke, traumatic brain injury, and Parkinson’s disease.
Parkinson's disease is a brain disorder that affects the neurons in a small portion of the brain known as the substantia nigra. These neurons produce dopamine, a neurotransmitter responsible for motor control and other important bodily functions. Parkinson’s disease progresses slowly. Symptoms typically worsen over years, gradually causing uncontrollable and unpredictable body movements, tremors, and muscular stiffness. In the late stages of the condition, patients may have trouble performing daily tasks such as walking or dressing. Since it is a brain disorder, Parkinson’s also affects patients’ mental states and can result in behavioral changes, dementia, and depression. Despite decades of research, no therapy has been discovered that fully reverses or slows the progression of the disease. Medications are available to relieve some Parkinson’s symptoms and make life easier for patients. For example, carbidopa-levodopa is a drug combination that both promotes the production and slows the reuptake of dopamine in the brain, easing some of the locomotor dysfunction caused by Parkinson’s disease. Brian Frenzel is a pharmaceutical industry veteran with decades of experience in drug discovery and development and building early-stage life science companies. During his career, he has focused on new products that address unmet medical needs in such diverse fields as infectious diseases; preterm labor; dysfunctional uterine bleeding; neurodegenerative diseases, including, stroke, Parkinson’s disease, and Alzheimer’s disease; and cancer. At Tosk, Inc., Brian Frenzel has led efforts to harness Drosophila melanogaster, the common fruit fly, to discover drugs to treat cancer.
Scientists have used the fruit fly for genetic research since the early 20th century. Six Nobel Prizes have been awarded for research using fruit flies. The fruit fly is a useful tool for the study of human diseases, since many fly genes are similar to those in humans, and fly organ systems play analogous roles to those in humans. With a short life cycle of about 25 days and their ease of feeding and care, flies are a very cost-effective animal in which to study diseases and develop treatments. Tosk Inc. has developed two new drug discovery models that use fruit flies. In the first, known as the Side Effect Fly™, researchers administer drugs with serious, adverse side effects to fruit flies to identify treatments that selectively block those side effects. The second method, known as the Genetically Modified Fly™, uses fruit flies that are genetically modified to include a human disease-causing gene in their makeup. These flies are then used to screen for treatments that selectively block the activity of the human disease gene. Brian Frenzel has served as president and chief executive officer of Tosk, Inc., since co-founding the Mountain View, California pharmaceutical company in 2008. He also maintains advisory roles with SanBio, Ltd. and a number of other biomedical companies and investment organizations. Beyond his various professional responsibilities, Brian Frenzel is an avid supporter of San Francisco-based sports teams, including the Golden State Warriors.
The Golden State Warriors joined professional basketball as the Philadelphia Warriors in the 1946-1947 Basketball Association of America (BAA) season. The franchise joined the National Basketball Association (NBA) in 1949 and relocated to San Francisco 12 years later, taking on the Golden State moniker in 1971. The Warriors won the BAA championship in their first year as a team and added NBA titles in 1956 and 1975. The team would go on to suffer a number of notable playoff droughts after these early successes, including only a single playoff appearance from 1994 to 2012. The 2012-2013 Warriors, led by sharpshooters Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson, would win 47 games, a 24-game improvement from the prior season, and reach the Western Conference Semifinals, signaling a turnaround in the franchise's championship fortunes. Following a competitive six-game series with the San Antonio Spurs in 2013, the 2013-2014 Warriors would continue to improve, this time winning 51 regular season games. The win total marked the franchise’s highest since 1992. The Golden State dynasty began in earnest the following season, as the 67-15 Warriors cruised through the Western Conference and overcame a LeBron James-led Cleveland Cavaliers squad to claim the franchise’s first championship in four decades. Golden State advanced to five consecutive NBA Finals from 2015 to 2019. The Warriors won three of their four titles during this run against the Cavaliers, with Kawhi Leonard and the Toronto Raptors prevailing over an injury-riddled Warriors team in 2019. The team averaged 64 regular season wins during this period, including an all-time NBA record 73 wins during the 2015-2016 season. Brian Frenzel has spent the past two decades as a private investor and management advisor with AnVent Enterprises, a private investment and advisory services provider located in Mountain View, California. In this role, Brian Frenzel provides funding and advising to early stage biomedical product companies, including those furthering the ongoing war against cancer. He also serves as CEO of cancer drug discovery company, Tosk, Inc. Cancer is one of the deadliest diseases known to mankind, with over 600,000 cancer deaths occurring every year in the United States. However, reports from the American Cancer Society state that the cancer death rate in the United States fell 2.2 percent from 2016 to 2017, the largest year-to-year drop-off ever recorded. Dating back to 1991, the cancer death rate among Americans has fallen nearly 30 percent, accounting for approximately 2.9 million lives saved over that timeframe. The online report was headed by American Cancer Society director of surveillance research Rebecca Siegel, and published in “CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians”. Dr. Spiegel stated that any impact made on the cancer mortality rate is a victory, particularly such a historic drop off. Various factors were cited to explain the decrease in mortality, ranging from advances in treatment for lung cancer, one of the deadliest forms of the disease, to reduced smoking rates among Americans. Brian Frenzel has dedicated his career in the life sciences industry to improving outcomes for patients suffering from debilitating and potentially life-threatening illnesses. Early in his career, he focused on infectious diseases such as AIDS and hepatitis and women’s health conditions such as preterm labor and dysfunctional uterine bleeding. More recently, Brian Frenzel has devoted his professional efforts toward cancer at Tosk, Inc. and neurodegenerative diseases at SanBio Ltd.
Tosk aims to improve patient outcomes for patients living with cancer. The company is involved in the development of drugs that improve the efficacy of existing cancer treatments and in discovering new drugs that disrupt the activity of cancer genes. When it comes to improving patient care, Tosk seeks to reduce or eliminate the adverse side effects of cancer treatments such as chemotherapy and radiation. These side effects can limit the dosing of cancer therapy and can be further debilitating to patients already suffering from disease. Tosk is currently developing drugs to ameliorate side effects such as mucositis. cardiomyopathy and congestive heart failure, kidney toxicity, and peripheral neuropathy. With over 30 years of professional management experience, Brian Frenzel served as president and chief executive officer at Adeza Biomedical and Centaur Pharmaceuticals. In addition to receiving his bachelor of science degree in physics and chemistry from Stanford University, Brian Frenzel also holds an MBA in finance and marketing from the Stanford Graduate School of Business. Currently the CEO of Tosk, Inc. in Mountain View, California, Brian Frenzel is an avid Stanford football fan. Mr. Frenzel has held season tickets to Stanford football games since his first year at Stanford. During that timeframe, he has missed only a handful of home games, and he has attended away games at such diverse locations as Japan, Florida, Oklahoma, Missouri, and Arizona. He has never missed a Stanford Rose Bowl game and can recount with pleasure the heroics of Jim Plunkett and Don Bunce in the 1971 and 1972 Rose Bowl games, as well as those of Christian McCaffrey in the 2016 Rose Bowl. Mr. Frenzel has never missed a home Big Game with the University of California and has traveled to Berkeley for many away games. He attended the 1982 Big Game in Berkley and had an excellent view from the stands of the three missed officials’ calls (knee down, forward lateral, Cal fans on the field) that resulted in the ignominious “The Play.” Frenzel’s view was later validated by the television crew of the 25th anniversary of The Play, who declared that “The Play would have been reversed upon replay, had replay existed.” He was also present in Berkeley for the redemption in 1990 afforded by “The Play II,” also known as “12 Seconds Over Berkeley.” Down 18-25 with 12 seconds on the clock, Stanford scored 9 points on 6 plays in the final 12 seconds to win the game 27-25. There were no disputed officials calls in this finish, and The Play II stands as a record for most points scored to win a football game with 15 seconds or less to go. Brian Frenzel has devoted his career to developing new medical products to address important, unmet medical needs. He has co-founded and invested in a number of innovative biomedical companies, including biopharmaceutical, cell therapy, medical device, and diagnostic product companies. In the process, Brian Frenzel has found himself at the forefront of medical research in such diverse fields as AIDS, Hepatitis C, pre-term labor, dysfunctional uterine bleeding, and neurodegenerative diseases such as stroke and Parkinson’s disease. Brian Frenzel’s most recent startup company, Tosk, Inc., is dedicated to improving outcomes for cancer patients. The company’s first products are designed to block the dose-limiting and potentially fatal adverse side effects of widely used cancer therapies. Recently, Tosk has discovered a new method to screen drugs for their potential to block cancer genes. This technology involves genetically modifying strains of the common fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, by implanting human genes into their genomes in such a way that compounds can be screened for their ability to block the cancer gene’s activity. Tosk uses this platform to discover candidate drugs for previously considered “undruggable” targets, such as the kRAS oncogene. Tosk believes that using a whole animal model, instead of traditional approaches, such as cell culture and molecular modeling, provides a relatively better platform to discover drugs for difficult-to-modulate targets. The company is deploying this approach to discover and develop new drugs for kRAS positive cancers, which include 90% of pancreatic, 45% of colon, and 35% of lung cancers. Life science entrepreneur and private investor Brian Frenzel has extensive experience founding and growing startups and guiding them to successful exits for investors. Drawing on his deep knowledge of biotechnology and biopharmaceuticals, Brian Frenzel is the CEO of Tosk, Inc. Tosk’s mission is to improve outcomes for cancer patients by eliminating the dose-limiting, often debilitating, and potentially fatal adverse effects of cancer therapies and to make certain therapies effective in patients who currently do not benefit from treatment. One of these drugs is TK-90, which recently completed the first phase of human clinical trials. TK-90 is designed to protect against the mucositis triggered by certain cancer therapies and antibiotics. Mucositis is caused by inflammation in the gastrointestinal tract and can result in painful ulcers in the mouth and throughout the GI tract. Mucositis can open a route of infection that can be dangerous for immune-compromised patients. Mucositis can also limit the dosing of certain cancer drugs to less than would otherwise be desirable. TK-90 has now entered the second phase of testing in head and neck cancer patients. This phase is designed to determine the optimal dose of TK-90 and to further demonstrate both the safety and efficacy of the drug. As a member of the Membership Committee of Band of Angels in California’s Silicon Valley, Brian Frenzel has decades of experience as a successful biomedical entrepreneur. Brian Frenzel currently heads the oncology drug research and development company Tosk, Inc. and serves on the Management Advisory Board of SanBio, Ltd., which is developing regenerative medicines for patients with neurodegenerative disorders such as stroke, traumatic brain injury, and Parkinson’s disease. Although researchers have yet to find a cure for Parkinson’s disease, a variety of treatment options exist. Physicians often recommend a regimen of exercise and physical therapy to help improve balance and mobility. In some cases, working with a speech-language pathologist can help treat speech impairments. Medications also may play an important role in treating Parkinson’s disease, especially in its later stages. One of the most common, levodopa, converts to dopamine in the brain, thereby improving mobility. Often, physicians prescribe carbidopa with levodopa to prevent the breakdown of levodopa before it enters the brain. Patients with extreme symptoms may want to consider surgery, such as deep brain stimulation (DBS), or cell therapy. In each case, physicians work with patients to treat individually manifesting symptoms. |
AuthorAt Genelabs Technologies in the 1980’s, Brian Frenzel served on the front lines in the war on HIV/AIDS and championed projects to identify and diagnose new hepatitis viruses. Archives
June 2020
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