Vice President, Business Development

About the role

The VP, Business Development is a senior leader that will own the articulation and initial execution of the business development strategy for a subset of companies with the Flagship Pioneering ecosystem with the opportunity to negotiate and conduct transactions. The primary objective of the business development team at Flagship is to drive the closing of valuable business development deals between our platform companies and Pharma.

The VP will be a key member of the of the company teams with a high degree of visibility within the company and within Flagship Pioneering. The successful executive will bring a proven track record in establishing the business development strategy for organizations that aligns to their long-term growth plans, identifying and triaging potential partners, and understanding of what it takes to design meaningful partnership concepts and term sheets.

• As an embedded company team member, drive development of the business development strategy for a portion of the Flagship Pioneering portfolio companies to enable consistent deal flow across the ecosystem
• Work as a cross-functional leader of the company, collaborating across multiple areas of the business to become an expert in their platform technology and products. Focus will be on establishing the BD strategy for the company and driving it to deal execution. Deal execution (deal concept or term sheet to final executed agreement) can be performed in partnership with transaction leaders
• Work closely with the CEO, relevant partner group, and members of the senior management team on the development of business development strategy as a contributor to corporate strategy and long-range planning, including identification of relevant value drivers of impactful deals.
• Enable the communication of the value proposition of the platform technology and portfolio by developing key messages and narratives to pressure test with stakeholders and build out into full partner able packages and deal concepts
• Frame the BD action plan including working with leadership to define data generation for validation, partnership scopes, research plans and exclusivity constructs
• Define the relevant biotech and pharma stakeholders.
• Lead and execute business development initiatives including outreach to potential pharma partners, diligence, and structuring of a transaction leveraging cross-functional team (e.g., R&D, Strategy, IP, legal, finance).
• Cultivate a strong and effective partnership with the CEO and relevant partners as a united team that pursues buy-in for the strategy across the Company and with the Board.
• Work closely with the R&D team to evaluate the potential of early-stage compounds and to integrate a partnership perspective early in the research and development process.

• Minimum 12 years’ industry experience with a demonstrated track record of business development and corporate strategy leadership.
• An advanced degree (PhD, MD) is strongly preferred. MBA is a plus.
• Previous Senior or Executive Leadership experience required with an enterprise leadership mindset across disciplines, lines, and organizational boundaries a must.
• Ability to understand complex scientific ideas and effectively communicate their value proposition to key internal and external stakeholders.
• Prior experience developing or partnering various types of biotechnology platforms or therapeutic modalities (e.g., small molecule, RNA, protein biologic), especially with discovery and preclinical- stage (Series A and
  
  B) companies.
• Excellent presentation and communications skills—the ability to compellingly articulate, influence, and work successfully with varied audiences.

A strong track record of meaningful strategy design and execution efforts with examples of impact on sell-side business development deals with pharmaceutical/biotech companies, including identifying, evaluating and successfully structuring significant business transactions.

Flagship Pioneering is a biotechnology company that invents and builds platform companies that change the world. We bring together the greatest scientific minds with entrepreneurial company builders…