Alison Taunton-Rigby, Ph.D., O.B.E., is an executive, leader and entrepreneur in the world of healthcare, life sciences and financial services. She has been President and CEO of several public and private biotechnology companies. As an entrepreneur she successfully founded, built and financed biotechnology companies, and has led teams that discovered, developed and introduced a number of life-saving drugs, many for diseases that affect children. Today these drugs are used successfully to treat thousands of patients.
Alison serves as a Director/Trustee on a number of public, private, college, foundation, nonprofit, ESOP and mutual fund boards, and currently sits on the boards of Blumont Inc, the International Women’s Forum, Simmons University and Boston Children’s Hospital.
Alison is a speaker and teacher in demand. She is active at the state, national and international levels, and has testified before federal congressional committees on issues of drug pricing, regulation, bioethics, and cloning. She is an active mentor to women, and also teaches at a number of Boston area universities in postgraduate courses.
Alison received her doctorate from the University of Bristol in England and is a graduate of the AMP program at the Harvard Business School. In 2002, she was awarded the OBE (Officer of the Order of the British Empire) by Queen Elizabeth II for her work as a leader in the research, development and promotion of biotechnology. In 2009 Alison was awarded a D.Sc. (Honoris Causae) by the University of Bristol.