Earl (Duke) Collier, president of the Braxton Company and innovation growth board chairman emeritus, served from 2010–2014 as the chief executive officer of 480 Biomedical, a medical device company, developing products used in the treatment of peripheral artery disease, and the executive chairman of Arsenal Medical, Inc., a medical device company. Duke was formerly executive vice president at Genzyme Corporation, a biotechnology company acquired by Sanofi for $20.1 billion in 2011. During his tenure at Genzyme, he was responsible for building the biosurgery business and overseeing the company’s efforts in oncology, multiple sclerosis, and other immune disorders. He led some of Genzyme’s significant acquisitions and the formation of MG Biotherapeutics, Genzyme’s joint venture with Medtronic Inc., which focused on cardiac cell therapy. He also served as president of Vitas Healthcare, a hospice provider, as a partner at the Washington, D.C.-based law firm of Hogan and Hartson, and as deputy administrator of the Health Care Finance Administration (now the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services) in the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services.
He is chairman of the board of trustees for the Newton-Wellesley Hospital, serves on the board of Mass General Brigham system, and as chairman emeretus of the Innovation growth board. From 2006 to 2009, he served as a director of publicly traded Decode Genetics Inc. (DGI Resolution, Inc.), a biopharmaceutical company, and he currently serves on the board of directors of Tesaro, Inc., a publicly traded biopharmaceutical company and Transmedics, a private medical device company. He earned a bachelor of arts at Yale University and received a law degree from the University of Virginia Law School.