The board of directors at San Diego-based Maravai LifeSciences, Inc. has appointed William ‘Trey’ Martin, III as the company’s new chief executive officer. Martin comes to Maravai from Danaher Corporation, where he was senior VP of New Business, Genomic Medicine.
CEO
Maravai LifeSciences
The company, a global provider of life science reagents and services to researchers and biotech innovators, said Maravai’s first CEO and co-founder, Carl Hull, will directly support Martin during this leadership transition and will remain with Maravai as executive board chair, where he will continue to guide the company’s long-term strategy.
“Trey has established a strong leadership track record over the course of his career in nucleic acid synthesis, and has experience leading global teams, managing complex R&D programs, driving global commercial initiatives, and executing strategic acquisitions. Additionally, he has a stellar reputation for driving employee engagement and operational excellence,” said Hull.
The ‘Right Choice’
Co-Founder
Maravai LIfeSciences
“Through my personal and professional interactions with Trey over the past fifteen years, and from my unique perspective as both a Board member and a significant shareholder, it is clear to me that he is the right choice to lead Maravai through its next phase of growth,” Hull added. “I fully expect that his leadership and industry knowledge will benefit our customers, employees and shareholders.”
Constantine “Dean” Mihas, a Maravai board member and co-CEO and managing director of GTCR, welcomed Martin and thanked Hull.
“On behalf of Maravai’s Board of Directors, I want to thank Carl for his partnership over many years of service, during which time he formed Maravai and subsequently oversaw an extraordinary period of growth and operational expansion as CEO,” Mihas said. “We look forward to our ongoing collaboration with him in his new capacity as Executive Chairman of the Board, where we will continue to benefit from his guidance, business leadership and industry expertise.”
Board member
Maravai LifeSciences
“Succession planning is one of the most important responsibilities we have as a board and we all were incredibly impressed by Trey’s expertise in genomics, particularly in the areas of mRNA, gene editing and nucleic acid chemistry,” Mihas added. “We also believe that his experience as a strategic operator in our space, along with his innate passion for the field, will enable him to drive Maravai’s growth strategy going forward.”
More than Two Decades of Leadership
“I am thrilled to be joining Maravai at this exciting time in the company’s evolution,” Martin said. “I want to commend Carl for his leadership and thank him and the Board for their confidence in me. I look forward to leading the outstanding team at Maravai, as we seek to further advance the field and enable the development of drug therapies, diagnostics and novel vaccines.”
Martin brings more than 25 years of executive leadership experience in life sciences operations, engineering, sales and marketing. He originally joined Danaher with the acquisition of Integrated DNA Technologies (IDT) in 2018 and served as president of the IDT business there for over three years.
Prior to its acquisition, Martin held positions of increasing responsibility over more than two decades at IDT and contributed to the consistent growth and competitiveness of the company’s primary oligo synthesis business through organic and inorganic growth investments. He holds a Bachelor’s in biochemistry from the University of Iowa.
In a release announcing the leadership change, the company said it will further discuss the management transition plan on its third quarter 2022 earnings call currently scheduled for November 2.
On Wall Street, investors had mixed reactions to news of the leadership change, with MRVI shares falling by more than 12% the day after the announcement (Oct. 4).
Maravai, which was co-founded by Hull and Eric Tardif in 2014, is a life sciences leader providing critical products to enable the development of drug therapies, diagnostics and novel vaccines and to support research on human diseases.
Maravai LifeSciences
FOUNDED: 2014
CEO: William Martin III
HEADQUARTERS: San Diego
EMPLOYEES: 550
REVENUE: $799 million (2021)
STOCK: MRVI (NASDAQ)
WEBSITE: maravai.com
NOTABLE: Maravai provides products and services in the fields of nucleic acid synthesis and biologics safety testing to many of the world’s leading biopharmaceutical, vaccine, diagnostics and cell and gene therapies companies.
