Flagship Pioneering Announces Appointment of Vaithianathan “Palani” Palaniappan as Chief Technology Officer of Pioneering Medicines

Cambridge, Mass., November 16, 2021 - Flagship Pioneering, the bioplatform innovation company, announced today that Vaithianathan “Palani” Palaniappan, Ph.D., has joined the company as Chief Technology Officer of Pioneering Medicines, a Flagship initiative that is expanding the use of Flagship’s innovative technologies to conceive and develop a broad portfolio of life-changing treatments.

In this role, Palani will lead the strategy and implementation of all Chemistry, Manufacturing and Controls (CMC) aspects of asset development, ensuring Pioneering Medicines establishes a consistent, effective, high-quality method for producing its medicines. Palani will partner with external contract development and manufacturing organizations as well as leaders from bioplatform companies across the Flagship ecosystem to lead CMC, pharmaceutical development and manufacturing efforts for all programs across Pioneering Medicines’ portfolio.

Palani brings more than 25 years of pharmaceutical development experience, across many modalities including biologics, antibody drug conjugates, RNA and DNA therapies, autologous and allogeneic stem cell therapies, and live microbial products. He most recently served as the Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at Aruvant Sciences overseeing gene and cell therapy development for rare diseases.

“Palani’s wide breadth of experience across numerous modalities will be extremely valuable to Pioneering Medicines as we develop novel therapeutics from Flagship’s innovative ecosystem,” said Paul Biondi, Executive Partner at Flagship Pioneering and President of Pioneering Medicines. “In his unique position, Palani will also provide critical pharmaceutical development and manufacturing insights to companies across the Flagship ecosystem as they seek to develop their own pipeline of assets.”

“I am honored and delighted to be joining Flagship Pioneering’s team of innovators,” added Palani Palaniappan, Chief Technology Officer, Pioneering Medicines. “Combining Flagship’s leading-edge modalities and scientific approaches with the research and development capabilities of Pioneering Medicines, presents a tremendous opportunity to create truly novel medicines for patients.”

About Vaithianathan “Palani” Palaniappan, Ph.D.

Palani joins Flagship Pioneering with over 25 years of pharmaceutical development experience. He most recently served as the Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at Aruvant Sciences overseeing gene and cell therapy development for rare diseases such as sickle cell disease and hypophosphatasia. His prior executive roles included Head of Global Technical Operations at Sarepta Therapeutics overseeing development of RNA and DNA therapies for neuromuscular and musculoskeletal conditions, and Global Head of Biologics and New Modality Development at Takeda Pharmaceuticals for over a decade focusing on oncology, GI and CNS diseases where he led teams based in Japan and the US. His early career included leadership positions of increasing responsibility at Millennium Pharmaceuticals which was acquired by Takeda, Biogen, Nexstar Pharmaceuticals which was acquired by Gilead and Par Pharmaceuticals. Throughout his career, Palani participated in all stages of development from research through commercial for portfolios of different modalities including biologics, antibody drug conjugates, RNA and DNA therapies, autologous and allogeneic stem cell therapies, and live microbial products.

Palani has completed executive leadership education at the University of Oxford and Insead. He received his Ph.D. in Chemistry from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur and completed his post-doctoral studies in biochemistry and biophysics at the University of California, Riverside and Virginia Commonwealth University. He holds a MS in chemistry and a BS in chemistry, physics, and mathematics from Annamalai University. From 2017 to 2020, Palani served on the Board of the International Consortium for Innovation & Quality (IQ), and from 2016 to 2018 he was IQ’s Inaugural Chair of the Biologics CMC Leadership Group.

About Pioneering Medicines

Pioneering Medicines is a strategic initiative within Flagship Pioneering that is dedicated to conceiving and developing a broad portfolio of life-changing treatments by leveraging and expanding the use of Flagship’s innovations. By harnessing the power of Flagship's multiple scientific platforms, Pioneering Medicines will create and advance novel medicines with the platform companies to accelerate the extension of their portfolios into novel areas and show that the platform can be applied more broadly, thereby delivering benefits to more patients and platforms, sooner.

About Flagship Pioneering

Flagship Pioneering conceives, creates, resources, and develops first-in-category bioplatform companies to transform human health and sustainability. Since its launch in 2000, the firm has, through its Flagship Labs unit, applied its unique hypothesis-driven innovation process to originate and foster more than 100 scientific ventures, resulting in more than $200 billion in aggregate value. To date, Flagship has deployed over $2.5 billion in capital toward the founding and growth of its pioneering companies alongside more than $19 billion of follow-on investments from other institutions. The current Flagship ecosystem comprises 42 transformative companies, including Axcella Health (NASDAQ: AXLA), Codiak BioSciences (NASDAQ: CDAK) Denali Therapeutics (NASDAQ: DNLI), Evelo Biosciences (NASDAQ: EVLO), Foghorn Therapeutics (NASDAQ: FHTX), Indigo Ag, Kaleido Biosciences (NASDAQ: KLDO), Moderna (NASDAQ: MRNA), Omega Therapeutics (NASDAQ: OMGA), Rubius Therapeutics (NASDAQ: RUBY), Sana Biotechnology (NASDAQ: SANA), Seres Therapeutics (NASDAQ: MCRB), and Sigilon Therapeutics (NASDAQ: SGTX).