Codon Devices Names Craig Muir Senior Vice-President, Technical Operations

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., March 24 /PRNewswire/ -- Codon Devices, the first venture-backed company in the emerging field of synthetic biology, announced today that it has named Craig D. Muir Senior Vice President, Technical Operations, a new position at the company. Previously, Mr. Muir had held a number of executive positions, including Vice President for Process Technology at Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Inc.

Mr. Muir brings more than twenty years of experience working with biotechnology companies on technology development and implementation. Among his responsibilities at Millennium, Mr. Muir built, developed, implemented and managed an ultra high throughput DNA synthesis and purification facility. Prior to his twelve-year tenure at Millennium, Mr. Muir worked in laboratory robotics and automation at Genentech, Inc.

In his role at Codon Devices, Mr. Muir will be responsible for the company's powerful BioFAB(TM) platform, including production operations, process development and platform strategy. He will report to President and CEO John P. Danner.

Mr. Danner said: "Craig is a world-class platform developer and we are pleased to have attracted someone of his caliber. Codon's groundbreaking BioFAB(TM) platform is the basis for our industry leadership in cost, throughput and turnaround time. It allows us to deliver great productivity to the research and commercial markets. Craig is the perfect person to drive invention and continuous improvement of this platform in order to maintain market leadership for the long term."

Mr. Muir commented, "I am very excited to be joining the team at Codon Devices. The company's strategy of industrializing synthetic biology will drive great advances in diverse areas such as genome analysis, drug discovery, drug manufacturing, agriculture and energy. Aggressive and insightful process development and invention will be critical for Codon's continued success."

In conjunction with Mr. Muir's arrival, Codon Devices has named Brian M. Baynes Chief Scientific Officer and Founder. Dr. Baynes, formerly Vice- President of Technology, will focus on research and development, external collaborations and applications strategy.

About Codon Devices

Codon Devices, based in Cambridge, MA, was founded in 2004 to pioneer commercial applications of Synthetic Biology. In June, 2005, Codon Devices raised $13M in a Series A financing involving Flagship Ventures, Kleiner Perkins, Alloy Ventures, and Mr. Vinod Khosla. Codon Devices' distinguished founding scientific advisory board (SAB) is comprised of top scientists in the field, including Chairman George Church, Harvard Medical School, David Baker, Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator at the University of Washington; Jim Collins, Boston University; Michael Elowitz, California Institute of Technology; Drew Endy, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Michael Hunkapiller, Alloy Ventures; Joseph Jacobson, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Jay Keasling, UC-Berkeley; Paul Modrich, Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator at Duke University; Christina Smolke, California Institute of Technology; Ron Weiss, Princeton University; and David Liu, Harvard University.

Codon Devices is developing its proprietary BioFAB(TM) production platform that is expected to accurately synthesize kilobase- to megabase-length genetic code, orders of magnitude more rapidly and less expensively than currently available technology. The company has internally developed and licensed-in intellectual property related to the efficient synthesis of DNA code. In addition, Codon Devices has developed proprietary designs and production processes related to the BioFAB(TM). The company's early commercial focus is on providing engineered devices for molecular biology research and engineered biotherapeutics. The company's core technology is expected to enable large-scale biological research, engineered cells that produce novel pharmaceuticals, improved vaccines, agricultural products, and biorefineries for the production of industrial chemicals and energy.

Codon Devices

CONTACT: John Danner of Codon Devices, +1-617-995-7988

Back to news