Sir Jonathan Symonds - Chair of GlaxoSmithKline

Sir Jonathan Symonds is the current Chair of GlaxoSmithKline plc. Together with Sir John Bell, Professor at Oxford University, Sir Jonathan also chaired the UK Life Sciences Vision’s External Advisory Board.

Europe and the U.K. have a unique opportunity to become global leaders in the life sciences if certain structural and cultural challenges can be overcome. We are excited to host this discussion and learn from his insights as an international life science leader as to how he thinks a European life science ventures can succeed.

Jon has extensive international financial, life sciences and governance experience. He served as an Independent Non-Executive Director of HSBC Holdings plc from 2014, and as Deputy Group Chair from 2018, until his retirement from the Board in 2020. He was previously Chair of HSBC Bank plc, Chief Financial Officer of Novartis AG, Partner and Managing Director of Goldman Sachs, Chief Financial Officer of AstraZeneca plc. His governance experience includes roles as Non-Executive Director/Chair of the Audit Committees of Diageo plc and QinetiQ Group plc and Non-Executive Chair of Proteus Digital Health Inc. Jon is also a Non-Executive Director at Rubius Therapeutics, Inc and Non-Executive Director at Genomics England Limited.