Dolsten Takes BenchSci's First-Ever Chairman Role as EMET Scales Across Global Biopharma
TORONTO—July 9, 2026—BenchSci, a leading provider of AI software for biopharma research and development, today announced the appointment of Dr. Mikael Dolsten, M.D., Ph.D., as Chairman of its Board of Directors, effective June 2026 — the first Chairman role in the company's history. Dr. Dolsten joined BenchSci's board as a director in July 2025, a year after retiring as Chief Scientific Officer and President of Pfizer Research & Development, where he could have taken a board seat at nearly any biopharma company in the world.
Dr. Dolsten is taking the chair, coming off of BenchSci's launch of EMET — the agentic research environment that gives every scientist an agentic team of PhD scientists, unifying data, models, workflows, coding, and scientific reasoning into a single environment purpose-built for preclinical R&D, the same way AI coding tools give every developer a team of expert engineers. After seeing EMET in action inside some of the world's biggest pharmaceutical companies, and using it himself, Dr. Dolsten knew he had to go all in on BenchSci. Early results back that conviction: 80% of EMET users report efficiency gains of up to 60%. As that momentum builds, BenchSci is formalizing its board leadership to match the scale — and the scientific stakes — of the work ahead.
"Mikael didn't join our board because he needed another board seat," said Liran Belenzon, CEO and Co-Founder, BenchSci. "He joined because he ran R&D at the scale we're building EMET for, and he saw before most people that the industry's biggest problem isn't ambition — it's infrastructure. Now he's chairing it because he believes we're solving that problem."
"I've spent my career watching good science get slowed down by bad infrastructure, not bad ideas," said Dr. Mikael Dolsten. "EMET is the first platform I've seen that actually orchestrates the fragmented pieces of modern science — literature, data, models, and reasoning — into one place where a scientist can get a real answer. I joined this board a year ago because I believed in that thesis. I'm taking the chair now, rather than staying on as a member, because I want to help build it, not just watch it."
Dr. Dolsten retired from Pfizer Inc. after 16 years as Chief Scientific Officer and President of Pfizer Research & Development, where he oversaw the approval of more than 36 medicines and vaccines and helped lead the company's global COVID-19 vaccine response. His career spans senior R&D leadership roles at Wyeth Research, Boehringer Ingelheim, AstraZeneca, and Pharmacia, and includes contributions to roughly 50 drug and vaccine approvals. He currently serves on the boards of Agilent Technologies, SOBI Specialty Pharma, Rocket Pharmaceuticals, Orbis Medicine, Arbor Biotechnologies, and ChAI Discovery, and advises Blackstone Life Sciences, Google’s GV, ARCH, Bain & Company, and Samsung Biologics.
As Chairman, Dr. Dolsten will work with Belenzon and the rest of the board on BenchSci's governance and long-term strategy as the company scales EMET across biopharma and academic research institutions worldwide.
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About BenchSci
BenchSci is a world leader in AI software for biopharma research and development on a mission to exponentially increase the speed and quality of life-saving R&D to help bring new medicines to patients faster. We apply AI to understand how disease biology works throughout the drug discovery pipeline to solve the number one reason drug discovery projects fail—getting the biology wrong. EMET, BenchSci's agentic AI workbench, unifies data, models, workflows, and scientific reasoning into a single environment purpose-built for preclinical R&D — giving every scientist an agentic team of PhD scientists to reason through disease biology behind every question. Backed by top-tier investors, including Generation Investment Management, Inovia Capital, TCV, F-Prime, Gradient Ventures (Google’s AI fund), and Golden Ventures, BenchSci has raised over $200 million. Our platform accelerates science at 16 top-20 pharmaceutical companies and over 4,500 leading research centers worldwide. For more information about BenchSci, visit www.benchsci.com.
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