PureTech Adds Dame Marjorie Scardino to Board of Directors, Names Joi Ito as Chairman of the Board and Expands Management Team
BOSTON, May 26, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- PureTech, a science-driven healthcare company seeking to solve some of today's toughest health challenges in disruptive ways, announced today that Dame Marjorie Scardino, Chairman of the MacArthur Foundation and former CEO of Pearson, has been appointed to PureTech's Board of Directors in the role of Senior Independent Director and that current Board member Joi Ito, MIT Media Lab's Director, has been appointed Board Chairman. Dr. Ben Shapiro, PureTech's outgoing Chairman and co-founder, former Executive Vice President of Basic & External Research at Merck, will remain an active member of the Board.
PureTech is also expanding its core team with the addition of Julie DiCarlo, former Head of Global Communications at Cubist Pharmaceuticals, as SVP of Communications and Investor Relations; and Spencer Ball, former Director of Executive Search/Talent Acquisition at PAREXEL, as Vice President of Talent Acquisition.
Dame Marjorie Scardino served as Chief Executive of The Economist for 12 years and then from 1997 through 2012 was the Chief Executive of Pearson plc, the world's leading education company and the owner of Penguin Books and The Financial Times Group. She is currently the Chairman of The MacArthur Foundation and is also a member of the non-profit boards of Oxfam, The Royal College of Art, and The Carter Center, as well as the for-profit boards of Twitter, where she sits on the audit committee, and IAG (the holding company of British Airways, Iberia and other airlines). Dame Marjorie has received a number of honorary degrees, and in 2003 was dubbed a Dame of the British Empire. She is also a member of the Royal Society of the Arts in the UK and the American Association of Arts and Sciences.
"PureTech is a visionary in the unexpected ways it goes about bringing science and cross-disciplinary ideas to bear on difficult health problems," said Dame Marjorie. "I am excited to serve on its Board, and I look forward to working with them to make an impact on patients' lives."
Dame Marjorie will be joining PureTech's existing Senior Partners and Board Members, Dr. Robert Langer, PureTech Co-founder and David H. Koch Institute Professor at MIT; Mr. Joi Ito, PureTech Chairman, MIT Media Lab Director and board member of Sony, the MacArthur Foundation, The New York Times, the Knight Foundation and Mozilla; Dr. Ben Shapiro, former EVP of Worldwide Basic and External Research at Merck; Dr. John LaMattina, former President of R&D at Pfizer Global Research and Development; Mr. Christopher Viehbacher, former CEO and member of the board of directors of Sanofi; Dr. H. Robert Horvitz, Nobel Laureate, David H. Koch Professor at MIT and Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute; Dr. Raju Kucherlapati, Paul C. Cabot Professor in the Harvard Medical School Department of Genetics, co-founder of Millennium Pharmaceuticals and Abgenix, and Member of President Obama's Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues; and Daphne Zohar, PureTech's Founder and CEO, recognized as a healthcare innovator and leader by The Boston Globe, MIT's Technology Review, Scientific American, BioWorld and others.
"Marjorie brings a wealth of proven business and leadership experience to our Board," said Daphne Zohar, PureTech's Chief Executive Officer. "Her insights and network will be extremely valuable as we continue to advance development of products between and beyond existing disciplines."
About PureTech
PureTech is a science-driven healthcare company, seeking to solve some of today's toughest health challenges through disruptive approaches. Based in Boston, PureTech has a network of more than 50 experts across multiple disciplines – from entrepreneurs to world-renowned scientists – giving PureTech access to potentially groundbreaking science and technological innovations. PureTech is problem-focused and solution-agnostic, looking beyond traditional disciplines and approaching healthcare problems from different perspectives. Focusing on areas of significant unmet medical need, PureTech evaluates more than 650 ideas per year, prioritizing, testing and selecting what it believes to be the most scientifically and commercially promising concepts to advance.
SOURCE PureTech
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