Disease breathalyser firm Owlstone appoints 'serial entrepreneur' to board
Owlstone Medical, a UK diagnostics company developing a breathalyser for early disease detection, has announced Dr Andy Richards has joined its board.
The company described Richards, who joins as non-executive director, as a 'serial entrepreneur' and business angel with an established track record in founding and scaling up innovative biotech and health technology companies in the UK.
His early career spans positions with ICI (now AstraZeneca) and PA Technology, and he was a founder and executive director of Chiroscience plc until its merger with Celltech in 1999.
Since that time he has founded, invested in and helped to scale more than 25 innovative ventures including Vectura, Arakis, and Cambridge Biotechnology Ltd. He received a CBE for services to life-science investment in 2015.
Dr Richards joins current board members - CEO and executive chairman, Billy Boyle, CEO of Owlstone Inc Dr Bret Bader, Regius Professor of Engineering, chief scientist for the Institute of Biomedical Engineering at Imperial College Prof Chris Toumazou, and medical director at Aviva UK Health, Dr Doug Wright.
Dr Andy Richards
Richards said: “Since its founding in 2016, Owlstone Medical’s development and growth have been remarkable. Given the potential of its Breath Biopsy platform to transform precision medicine and the early detection of disease I have no doubt that this will only continue, and I am very pleased to be able to play a part as the business scales.”
Billy Boyle, co-founder and CEO at Owlstone Medical, said: “Andy has been a good friend and advisor to Owlstone Medical for some time, and we are thrilled to be able to formalise our relationship and directly benefit at board level from his deep experience in the development and growth of early-stage life science companies. Andy’s guidance will have a significant impact on the business as we seek to establish Breath Biopsy as a new industry category and to achieve our goal of saving 100,000 lives.”
