The immunologist and biotech leader reflects on career change, resilience, and the value of staying open to new directions.
BOSTON, MA / ACCESS Newswire / September 7, 2026 / Philip Ashton-Rickardt has spent much of his career working in environments where change is constant. From academic research to biotech entrepreneurship, his path has included major shifts in role, responsibility, and focus.
For Ashton-Rickardt, reinvention has not meant abandoning one career for another. It has meant building on what came before while being willing to move in a new direction.
He began his career in academic science after earning a BSc with honours from King’s College London and a PhD in Molecular Immunology from the University of Edinburgh. He later completed postdoctoral research at MIT before joining the University of Chicago, where he progressed from Assistant Professor to Associate Professor with tenure.
In 2006, he moved to Imperial College London, where he served as Chair and Professor until 2017. By that point, he had spent more than two decades building an academic career.
The next step was very different.
Ashton-Rickardt returned to Boston and founded Smith Therapeutics, marking his move from academia into biotechnology and company building. The transition required him to apply his scientific background in a new setting while learning the practical demands of entrepreneurship.
“I had to chart my own progress through college to an academic career,” Ashton-Rickardt has said of his early life. He believes that experience helped prepare him for later periods when there was no obvious path forward.
His career since then has included senior scientific leadership positions at AZTherapies and Sigilon Therapeutics, as well as work with early-stage biotechnology companies. He also co-founded Halyard Therapeutics and now serves as Managing Director and Chief Scientific Officer at BE Therapeutics.
Across those changes, Ashton-Rickardt has continued to return to a few principles.
“Resilience, flexibility, hard work, curiosity,” he has said when describing the qualities that have helped him navigate his career.
For scientists, career reinvention can be difficult because professional identity is often built over many years. Ashton-Rickardt’s own experience shows that changing direction does not necessarily mean starting from zero. Skills developed in research, teaching, team leadership, and problem solving can carry into very different environments.
His move into biotechnology also changed the way he approached scientific work. In an academic setting, the goal may be to answer an important question. In industry, science also has to operate within a larger structure that includes teams, timelines, resources, and long-term development goals.
That shift requires a different type of flexibility.
Ashton-Rickardt believes continued learning is one of the most important parts of adapting successfully. “Always learn,” he has said, a principle that has remained relevant as his career has moved across academia, startups, established biotechnology companies, and advisory roles.
He also sees reinvention as something that can happen more than once. His career has included periods as a researcher, professor, founder, scientific executive, advisor, and company builder.
Rather than viewing those stages as separate careers, Ashton-Rickardt sees them as connected by the same underlying interest in science and the desire to create something meaningful.
His experience also reflects a broader reality in biotechnology. Careers do not always move in a straight line, and unexpected changes can force professionals to reconsider what they want from their work.
For Ashton-Rickardt, the response has been to keep moving forward while staying open to a different route.
“Take one step at a time,” he has said.
It is a simple approach, but one that has shaped a career defined by change, persistence, and a willingness to keep learning.
About Philip Ashton-Rickardt
Philip Ashton-Rickardt is an immunologist, biotech entrepreneur, and scientific executive. He earned a BSc with honours from King’s College London and a PhD in Molecular Immunology from the University of Edinburgh before completing postdoctoral research at MIT. His career has included academic positions at the University of Chicago and Imperial College London, as well as leadership roles across several biotechnology companies. He currently serves as Managing Director and Chief Scientific Officer at BE Therapeutics and as co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer of Halyard Therapeutics.
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SOURCE: Philip Ashton-Rickardt
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