Flagship Pioneering Appoints Craig Williams as CEO-Partner and Chief Executive Officer of Apriori Bio

PRNewswire 13-Nov-2024 8:00 AM

Williams was promoted from Operating Partner at Flagship Pioneering and President at Apriori Bio

Apriori Bio has made significant progress in 2024, including securing a collaboration with CEPI, assembling a world class board of directors and building out an early pipeline of prospective vaccines

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Nov. 13, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Flagship Pioneering, the bioplatform innovation company, and Apriori Bio, a biotechnology company aimed at providing humanity with variant-resilient protection against rapidly-evolving viruses, today announced that Craig Williams, MBA, has been promoted to CEO-Partner at Flagship Pioneering and Chief Executive Officer of Apriori.

Williams joined Flagship as an Operating Partner and President of Apriori in 2023 after more than two decades at GSK and ViiV Healthcare. During his time at GSK, Williams oversaw commercialization of vaccines and medicines in the Americas, Europe, Africa and Asia, and helped launch more than 15 vaccines and medicines around the world.

"Craig is a proven leader who has dedicated his career to the advancement of innovative vaccines and therapies that address a wide range of diseases," said Noubar Afeyan, Ph.D., Founder and CEO of Flagship Pioneering. "His deep experience with the development, launch and commercialization of vaccines will continue to be critical to Apriori as the team develops the next-generation of vaccines to provide variant-resilient protection from emerging threats."

"I'm thrilled to hand over the leadership of Apriori to Craig, as he has already made a significant impact over the last year in his role as the company's President," said Lovisa Afzelius, Ph.D., MBA, General Partner at Flagship Pioneering and Co-Founder and Chair of Apriori. "Under his strong leadership, I'm confident Apriori will continue to establish itself as a next generation vaccine design company, providing prospective protection for humanity globally."

Over the last year, Williams has been instrumental in driving Apriori's operations, building out the company's early pipeline and increasing its global reach, securing key sources of funding and collaboration, including Apriori's first collaboration with CEPI to build the next generation of vaccines, and growing Apriori's culture and team, including a world-renowned board of directors.

"I am honored to lead the Apriori team as we work to secure our future health with the development of innovative vaccines," said Williams. "Since joining Apriori last year, I have been deeply impressed with the capabilities and advancement of our Octavia platform and the progress we have made toward bringing new vaccines to patients. I look forward to guiding the team through the next critical stages of development."

About Craig Williams, MBA

Craig Williams joined Flagship Pioneering in 2023 and has helped drive value creation, scientific progress, strategy and execution for ProtoCos and NewCos. He also served as President of Apriori Bio where he helped transform operations and drive growth.

Prior to Flagship, Williams spent more than two decades at GSK and ViiV Healthcare. During his time at GSK, Williams was charged with developing business strategies, managing operations and driving sales for vaccines and therapeutics globally, helping to launch over 15 vaccines and medicines around the world. He took on roles of increasing scope and complexity, culminating in his most recent position as Global Vaccines Commercialization Lead where he oversaw a cross-functional team responsible for the development and launch of vaccines across the company's portfolio. Williams has also served as Head of ViiV International, in which he oversaw ViiV's HIV business in nearly 150 countries and facilitated access to innovative HIV medicines for millions of new patients in low- and middle-income countries.

Williams received both an MBA and B.A. from Florida A&M University School of Business & Industry.

About Flagship Pioneering
Flagship Pioneering invents and builds bioplatform companies, each with the potential for multiple products that transform human health or sustainability. Since its launch in 2000, Flagship has originated and fostered more than 100 scientific ventures, resulting in more than $75 billion in aggregate value. Flagship is operating with $14 billion of assets under management as of its latest capital raise, announced in July 2024. The current Flagship ecosystem comprises 43 companies, including Foghorn Therapeutics (NASDAQ:FHTX), Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA), Omega Therapeutics (NASDAQ:OMGA), Sana Biotechnology (NASDAQ:SANA), Generate Biomedicines, Inari, Indigo Agriculture, and Tessera Therapeutics.

About Apriori Bio
Apriori is working to create a world that is protected against viral threats. Our pioneering approach centers on a unique technology platform, Octavia™, which allows us to survey the entire landscape of existing and potential viral variants to design new vaccines against the most threatening variants. Octavia can also inform public health policy in real time by predicting the impact of emerging variants. Apriori was founded in 2020 in Flagship Labs, a unit of Flagship Pioneering. For more information visit www.aprioribio.com or follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter at @AprioriBio.

Media Contacts

Flagship Pioneering
press@flagshippioneering.com 

Apriori Bio
Morgan Warners
FGS Global
morgan.warners@fgsglobal.com  

Melanie West
FGS Global
melanie.west@fgsglobal.com 

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SOURCE Flagship Pioneering