ImmunityBio Appoints Former World Bank President Dr. Jim Yong Kim as Vice Chairman to Drive Global Access Initiatives
核心洞察
ImmunityBio has appointed Dr. Jim Yong Kim, former World Bank President, as Vice Chairman to lead international partnerships and global access efforts through a newly created Office of the Executive Chairman.
Dr. Kim brings decades of experience at the intersection of medicine, public health, and global finance, including co-founding Partners In Health and leading the WHO's HIV (搜索)/AIDS (搜索) department.
He will focus on building relationships with governments, health ministries, and multilateral institutions to expand access to ImmunityBio's immunotherapy platform and approved therapies outside the United States.
ImmunityBio, Inc. (NASDAQ: IBRX), a commercial-stage immunotherapy company, announced on August 10, 2026, that Dr. Jim Yong Kim, former President of the World Bank Group, has joined the company as Vice Chairman. Dr. Kim will serve in a newly created Office of the Executive Chairman, reporting directly to Founder and Executive Chairman Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, where he will focus on strengthening the company's international partnerships and global access initiatives.
The appointment signals ImmunityBio's strategic intent to expand the reach of its immunotherapy platform beyond the United States, leveraging Dr. Kim's extensive network across governments, health ministries, multilateral institutions, and global health organizations.
A Career Dedicated to Global Health Equity
Dr. Kim brings a distinguished career spanning medicine, public health, development, and global finance. He served as the twelfth president of the World Bank Group from 2012 to 2019, where he established the institution's goals to end extreme poverty by 2030 and to lift up the poorest 40 percent of people in developing countries. During his tenure, the World Bank launched the Pandemic Emergency Financing Facility, one of the first financial instruments designed to rapidly deploy funds to contain outbreaks before they spread.
In 1987, Dr. Kim co-founded Partners In Health alongside Dr. Paul Farmer and others, building treatment programs for drug-resistant tuberculosis (搜索), HIV (搜索), and AIDS (搜索) in some of the world's most impoverished communities across Haiti, Peru, and beyond. From 2003 to 2005, he directed the World Health Organization's HIV/AIDS department, where he led the "3 by 5" initiative — the first global target for AIDS treatment — which expanded access to antiretroviral medicines throughout the developing world.
Dr. Kim has also served as president of Dartmouth College, held professorships at Harvard Medical School and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and is a recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship. He was named one of TIME magazine's 100 Most Influential People. He currently serves as Vice Chairman and Senior Advisor at Global Infrastructure Partners, a part of Blackrock, and as Chancellor of the University of Global Health Equity in Rwanda.
Strategic Vision for Global Access
"Dr. Kim has spent his life working to bring care to people and communities that too often face the greatest barriers to access," said Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, Founder, Executive Chairman, and Global Chief Scientific and Medical Officer of ImmunityBio. "Our mission is to harness the power of the immune system to address some of the world's most challenging diseases. Dr. Kim's experience across global health, development finance, governments, and multilateral institutions will be invaluable as we work to build the partnerships that can help advance our science, support clinical development, and expand access to our approved therapies around the world."
Dr. Kim expressed alignment with the company's mission, stating: "I have spent my career focused on ensuring that scientific and medical advances reach the people who need them most. ImmunityBio is pursuing an ambitious vision grounded in immunology, innovation, and global impact that has the potential to improve countless lives. I am excited to work with Dr. Soon-Shiong and the team to build partnerships across governments, health system, and international institutions that can help accelerate research, broaden access and bring the benefits of these advances to patients around the world."
The ImmunityBio Platform
ImmunityBio's therapeutic strategy centers on the Cancer (搜索) BioShield™ platform, designed to stimulate critical lymphocytes — including natural killer (NK) cells, cytotoxic T cells, and memory T cells — through the company's proprietary IL-15 (搜索) receptor agonist, ANKTIVA® (nogapendekin alfa inbakicept). This antibody-cytokine fusion protein anchors a broader portfolio that includes adenovirus-vectored vaccines, allogeneic and autologous NK-cell therapies, and additional immunomodulators intended to promote immunogenic cell death and support durable immune responses while potentially reducing reliance on high-dose chemo-radiation therapy.
The company's approach harnesses both the adaptive and innate immune systems with the goal of restoring immune function and generating lasting immunological memory in patients, targeting applications across cancer (搜索) and infectious diseases.
The newly formed Office of the Executive Chairman will bring together senior leaders to support Dr. Soon-Shiong on strategy, partnerships, and initiatives intended to advance ImmunityBio's scientific and clinical programs globally, with Dr. Kim's appointment representing a key step in the company's international expansion strategy.