Capricor Therapeutics announced that it has appointed Xavier Avat as Chief Business Officer. In this role, Mr. Avat will oversee Capricor's strategic priorities, the commercialization of its pipeline products and business development activities. Prior to joining Capricor, Mr. Avat served as Senior Vice President, Global Corporate Strategy and New Initiatives, at Edwards Lifesciences, a global medical technology leader, where he led the company's global strategy and corporate performance metrics, as well as initiated and incubated market development and franchise initiatives.

Before that, Mr. Avat served as Vice President, Corporate Development (in the Americas) and General Manager (Canada), at Santen Pharmaceuticals. Prior to that, Mr. Avat was with Gilead Sciences, where he held positions of increasing responsibility, including corporate development, as the GM of Latin America, and then as part of the U.S. team that launched Sovaldi. Earlier in his career, he held various leadership positions at Schering Plough (now Merck), Genentech and bioMérieux.

Mr. Avat obtained his Master of Business Administration degree from Edhec Business School and a Master of Science degree in bioengineering from Polytech Lille in France.