Metaphore Biotechnologies Appoints Frank D’Amelio and Pascal Deschatelets to Board of Directors
D’Amelio has built and reshaped businesses across technology and pharmaceuticals, including nearly 15 years helping
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Metaphore Biotechnologies (“Metaphore”), a Flagship Pioneering company developing antibody medicines designed for the dynamic biology of complex disease, today announced the appointment of Frank D’Amelio and Pascal Deschatelets, Ph.D., as independent directors to the Company’s Board. As Metaphore prepares for clinical development, their appointments bring substantial scientific and business leadership to translating the Company’s platform into new categories of antibody medicines designed to activate targets, tune signaling, or engage multiple targets.
“Frank brings financial judgment tested through major transactions and the operating experience of delivering medicines to patients worldwide. Pascal brings a rigorous scientific lens to the decisions that turn novel biology and platform potential into new medicines,” said Lovisa Afzelius, Ph.D., MBA, Co-Founder and Board Chair, Metaphore and General Partner, Flagship Pioneering. “Along with the other Board members and leadership team, they will help align Metaphore’s scientific ambition with the development strategy, organizational capabilities, and capital needed to build a successful medicines company.”
Deschatelets combines a chemist’s rigor with experience building biotechnology companies around novel science and carrying therapeutic concepts through drug design, clinical development, and regulatory approval. He co-founded Apellis Pharmaceuticals, where he served as Chief Operating Officer for more than a decade and later became its Chief Scientific Officer. At Apellis, Deschatelets set the company’s scientific direction, built the organization, and helped deliver multiple first-in-class treatments, including the first approved treatment for geographic atrophy. This led to Biogen acquiring Apellis in 2026 in a transaction valued at approximately $5.6 billion upfront. He also co-founded Potentia Pharmaceuticals, whose ocular complement program was licensed to Alcon. He is an inventor on more than 90 patents and an author of more than 40 scientific publications.
“Metaphore has created a compelling system for learning from biology as it behaves in living cells, then using that information to guide antibody design,” said Deschatelets. “A platform becomes meaningful when it informs the choices a company makes about its medicines. I look forward to working with the Board and leadership team as they turn those insights into programs with a clear scientific rationale, medical value, and a path to patients.”
D’Amelio brings more than four decades of experience financing innovation, directing global operations, and creating independent businesses. During nearly 15 years as Pfizer’s CFO, he led acquisitions and partnerships valued at nearly $200 billion, including Wyeth, Hospira, Anacor, and Medivation, and helped establish Zoetis. His responsibilities expanded to business operations and global supply, including oversight of manufacturing during the initial COVID-19 vaccine rollout. He also led the formation of Pfizer’s consumer health joint venture with GSK and the combination of its Upjohn business with Mylan to create Viatris. He serves on the boards of Zoetis, Humana, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Viatris, and Sail Biomedicines.
“Decisions about how a medicine will be financed, manufactured, and supplied deserve attention well before it reaches the clinic,” said D’Amelio. “I’m looking forward to working with Metaphore to build those requirements into program selection, investment decisions, and development plans from the outset, so the company becomes an organization that can carry its therapeutic platform potential through to patients.”
About Metaphore Biotechnologies
Metaphore Biotechnologies is creating the next era of antibody medicines. The company’s platform integrates a proprietary experimental functional data engine with a mechanism-aware computational engine to design antibodies with mechanisms to activate, tune, and engage biology in entirely new ways. Metaphore’s pipeline is focused on high-value disease areas, including metabolic disease and immunology, where treatment requires complex approaches that go beyond blocking biology. The company was founded in 2021 in Flagship Labs, a unit of Flagship Pioneering. For more information, visit www.metaphorebio.com or follow us on LinkedIn and X.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20261026478390/en/
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