August 11, 2015
By Alex Keown, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff
SEATTLE – Can a chief financial officer with solid M&A experience take cancer immunotherapy drugmaker Adaptive Biotechnologies public? That’s a question investors may soon find out.
Fresh of a May infusion of $195 million in Series F financing, Adaptive Biotechnologies tapped Chad Cohen as its new chief financial officer, the company announced on Monday.
Cohen came to Adaptive after spending nine years at the online real estate company Zillow. While at Zillow, Cohen oversaw nine acquisitions as well as helped take the company public.
Chad Robbins, president and chief executive officer at Adaptive, said in a statement that Cohen has a “truly impressive track record in disruptive, fast-moving, technology-driven companies and is the ideal candidate to help support Adaptive’s rapid growth.” He said Cohen has proven himself with a strong record in “lucrative” merger and acquisition strategies.
Cohen has served on Adaptive’s board of directors since March. During that time he said he has become excited about the company’s growth potential.
“The remarkable pace at which Adaptive has grown along with its outstanding financial footing are evidence of the passion and drive the executive team and employees have for advancing how we understand and treat disease. I am thrilled to be a part of this driving force and I am looking forward to continuing the momentum of growth and leadership within this highly complex and game-changing industry of immune profiling,” he said in a statement.
The May funding of $195 million, led by Matrix Capital Management, came after a spate of funding rounds that provided more than $400 million to the company. The fundraising caught the eye of longstanding tech journalist and GeekWire founder John Cook, who said in a column the very size of the round was astonishing.
“To put the $195 million figure in perspective, consider this,” wrote Cook. “Last quarter, there was $381 million invested throughout the entire Pacific Northwest, so that mean’s Adaptive’s latest funding round is more than half of all the money raised last quarter.”
Some have speculated the next step for the company is to go public, which is something Cohen has experience doing. However, in an interview with the Puget Sound Business Journal, Cohen said he would not comment on possible financial moves for Adaptive. However, he said his position is to prepare the company for organic growth, “to prepare a company for a whole array of opportunities, whether in the M&A space or capital space.”
In 2013 Cohen was named Puget Sound Business Journal‘s CFO of the year. Before his tenure at Zillow, Cohen worked for Ticketmaster Entertainment as assistant controller and financial integrity manager. Before that he served as vice president and assistant controller for Countrywide Bank and supervising senior auditor at Ernst & Young.
