Anthropic adds Novartis CEO

Anthropic said Tuesday that Vas Narasimhan, the chief executive of Novartis, has joined its board of directors through the company’s Long-Term Benefit Trust. (anthropic.com) The appointment was announced April 14, 2026. Anthropic said Narasimhan is a physician-scientist, and Reuters reported he is the first pharmaceutical-industry executive to join the artificial intelligence company’s board. (anthropic.com) (finance.yahoo.com) Anthropic said Trust-appointed directors now hold a majority of the board. The company listed the board as Dario Amodei, Daniela Amodei, Yasmin Razavi, Jay Kreps, Reed Hastings, Chris Liddell, and Narasimhan. (anthropic.com) The Long-Term Benefit Trust is the unusual part of this story. Anthropic said in September 2023 that the trust is an independent body of five members with no financial stake in the company and the power to select and remove a growing share of directors, ultimately a majority. (anthropic.com) Anthropic paired that trust with public-benefit-corporation status, a legal structure that lets a company weigh a stated public mission alongside shareholder returns. Anthropic says that mission is to develop advanced artificial intelligence for the long-term benefit of humanity. (anthropic.com) Narasimhan’s résumé explains why Anthropic wanted him in the room. Novartis says he has been chief executive since February 1, 2018, leads a company with more than 77,000 employees operating in about 120 countries, and oversaw medicines that reached more than 300 million patients in 2025. (novartis.com) Novartis also says Narasimhan has overseen the approval of more than 35 novel medicines and vaccines over his career. Anthropic said that experience comes from one of the world’s most heavily regulated industries, where safety, approval, and large-scale deployment all matter. (novartis.com) (anthropic.com) The company has been widening the board beyond its founders for months. Anthropic added former Microsoft chief financial officer Chris Liddell on February 13, 2026, and Reuters said Narasimhan is the second new board addition since then. (anthropic.com) (finance.yahoo.com) Anthropic has also been adding expertise around policy and public institutions to the trust itself. In January 2026, it named Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar, the former California Supreme Court justice and Carnegie Endowment president, to the Long-Term Benefit Trust. (anthropic.com) Narasimhan said in Anthropic’s announcement that artificial intelligence is already helping healthcare researchers study disease biology and design better medicines. His board seat gives Anthropic a director whose career has centered on regulated science, global health, and the question the company keeps raising: how to deploy powerful systems responsibly. (anthropic.com)