Adaptimmune CEO Noble to retire, CFO Rawcliffe steps up to the plate

After a global search, Adaptimmune has found its next CEO at home, Chief Financial Officer Adrian Rawcliffe will take over in September when CEO and co-founder James Noble retires. The T-cell therapy specialist is now on the hunt for a new CFO.  “We were very fortunate to have Adrian as a candidate, not only given his role as CFO, covering a wide range of responsibilities from manufacturing to information management, but also his previous experiences at [GlaxoSmithKline]. … Adrian will now lead the company towards commercialization,” said David Mott, chairman of Adaptimmune’s board, in a statement.  Rawcliffe joined Adaptimmune in March 2015, about a year after the company inked an R&D pact with GlaxoSmithKline potentially worth more than $350 million. He had worn various hats at GSK since 1988, including senior vice president overseeing worldwide business development and R&D finance, managing partner and president of SR One, Glaxo’s venture capital arm, and most recently, SVP of finance for the company’s North American pharma unit.  Since then, Adaptimmune has grown, pulling off a $191 million IPO in May 2015 and building a new R&D outpost near its headquarters in Oxford, U.K.