Group Chief Financial Officer — Precision-Oncology Portfolio

The mandate

A San Diego oncology company has reached an uncomfortable but valuable point: its precision-medicine platform can generate targets faster than the balance sheet can advance them. One wholly owned small-molecule programme is approaching a dose-expansion decision, a second asset has attracted preliminary licensing interest, and the discovery engine continues to produce opportunities carrying expensive biomarker and translational requirements. The board must choose whether to build an integrated oncology company around the lead asset or monetise selected programmes and operate as a repeatable discovery platform.

The financial architecture does not yet support that choice. Research commitments, clinical purchase orders, milestone obligations and headcount plans are maintained in different systems; programme forecasts reconcile late and often omit contingent spend. The last financing was completed when capital was more available, and the next raise must be based on demonstrated clinical and portfolio value rather than the promise of the platform alone. Several sophisticated investors have asked for clearer asset-level returns, downside cases and evidence that management will enforce termination criteria.

The Group Chief Financial Officer will be a strategic counterweight and a builder. The role owns capital allocation, financing, business-development economics, accounting, tax, treasury, investor relations and the financial operating system. It also carries a central part in the platform-versus-asset decision: identifying what each model truly costs, how long it can be funded, which capabilities must be owned and which value rights should never be traded away cheaply.

The organisation has approximately 200 employees, the majority in research and development, with specialist laboratories and clinical partners across the United States and Europe. The CFO will work from San Diego and report to the Chief Executive and the relevant board committee. This is a permanent executive appointment with routine interaction with the full board, current institutional investors and prospective strategic counterparties.

Why this seat is open

The incumbent CFO will leave after the annual audit to join a larger commercial-stage business. The departure is orderly and unrelated to financial control. The board is using the succession to appoint a finance leader whose experience extends beyond fundraising and reporting into asset economics, partnership design and the disciplined allocation of scarce development capital.

What you will own

• Build an asset-level planning model covering discovery spend, biomarker development, clinical operations, manufacturing, milestone obligations and shared-platform cost for every funded programme.
• Advise the board on the integrated-company, platform and hybrid strategic cases, including dilution, probability-adjusted value, cash-at-risk and capability requirements under each route.
• Maintain a minimum 18-month rolling liquidity view and lead the next equity, structured-finance or strategic-capital transaction without creating covenants that compromise programme choices.
• Own accounting, tax, treasury, procurement controls and audit for an approximately 200-person international organisation, ensuring research accruals and clinical commitments are complete and timely.
• Lead financial workstreams in licensing discussions: valuation ranges, opt-in structures, development-cost sharing, milestones, royalties, territorial rights and termination consequences.
• Give programme leaders usable financial accountability through quarterly resource reviews and explicit continuation gates, not finance-led micromanagement of scientific work.
• Direct investor relations and board reporting, reconciling scientific claims, operating milestones and cash requirements before information reaches external stakeholders.
• Recruit and develop a finance team capable of supporting a potential public-company pathway, including technical accounting, controls, tax planning and transaction execution.

The first 12 months

• Days 1–90: Validate cash, commitments and all material clinical or research accruals. Reconstruct the asset-level forecast, identify unfunded obligations and present a no-surprises runway view. Agree decision criteria for the platform-versus-asset review and establish a transaction calendar that reflects clinical readouts rather than an arbitrary fundraising date.
• Months 4–9: Take the strategic options paper to the board with probability-adjusted economics and clear consequences for organisation design. Prepare diligence materials, engage financing and licensing counterparties, and implement programme-level investment reviews. Close audit recommendations and install controls proportionate to the company’s scale and potential listing ambitions.
• Months 10–12: Execute the chosen capital transaction or partnership, translate its obligations into the operating plan, and fund the following 24 months with named contingencies. Complete the finance leadership bench and deliver a board-approved long-range plan connecting clinical evidence, portfolio gates and shareholder value.

What the board will measure

• Accuracy of the 13-week cash forecast and absence of unrecorded material clinical, manufacturing or milestone commitments.
• A documented board decision on the future business model, supported by asset-level economics and downside cases that scientific and financial leaders both accept.
• At least 24 months of funded runway after the selected transaction and portfolio actions, measured without assuming uncommitted licensing proceeds.
• Completion of the annual audit to timetable with no material weakness and closure of agreed high-priority control findings.
• Partnership economics that preserve the programme rights and option value identified as strategic before negotiations began.
• Improved capital productivity, evidenced by resources moving promptly from stopped or deferred programmes to board-approved priorities.

The person

You are a sitting biotechnology CFO, a divisional CFO in an innovative biopharma group, or a finance and business-development leader ready for full enterprise accountability. You bring at least 28 years of relevant experience and have controlled a minimum USD 200 million annual operating and investment plan. You have led teams of at least 50 across finance and closely linked functions, and influenced a broader research organisation of comparable scale to this company.

Your background may come from oncology, rare disease, diagnostics-led therapeutics or another R&D-intensive sector in which programme value depends on evidence, probability and time. You have built asset economics rather than simply consolidating department budgets. At least one material capital-markets financing and one licensing, option or co-development transaction should bear your direct signature or negotiating responsibility.

The board will value technical depth: research and clinical accruals, collaboration accounting, valuation of contingent consideration, tax implications of intellectual-property structures and controls expected by institutional investors. Equally important is your ability to disagree constructively. You must be willing to challenge an attractive scientific narrative when the proposed development path cannot be financed, and to defend a long-term programme when short-term spreadsheet logic understates its option value.

Candidates should already understand US capital markets and be able to work principally from San Diego. Experience with a listed company is useful but a private, institutionally backed company that operated to public-company standards can also qualify. The role requires confidential engagement with potential partners across time zones; travel will be purposeful rather than ceremonial.

Compensation and terms

The expected base salary is USD 500,000–750,000, plus annual incentive and long-term participation whose performance conditions will reflect financing quality, portfolio decisions and enterprise value rather than transaction volume alone. The appointment is permanent and reports to the Chief Executive with direct access to the relevant board committee. Documented forfeited equity may be considered in final terms; no applicant fee is payable.

Confidentiality

The company and its assets will remain unnamed until the search team confirms fit and both parties complete the required confidentiality process. Applicants must rely on the information supplied through the authorised process and should not attempt to identify the client through third parties.

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