Ian Read

Ian C. Read (born 1953) is a Scottish business executive and a chartered accountant, who is executive chairman of the pharmaceutical company Pfizer.

Early life Read was born in Forfar, Scotland, to a Scottish mother, but his parents returned to Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) when he was six-weeks-old, and he grew up there.

Read received a bachelor's degree in chemical engineering from the University of London in 1974. He qualified as a chartered accountant in 1978.

Career Read has spent his entire career with Pfizer, starting in 1978 as an operational auditor. He is a member of the Pfizer Leadership Team.

On 5 December 2010, Read is now an American citizen.

By October 2015 during the Drug Pricing Firestorm, Forbes journalist Matthew Herper, wrote how "Read, with his calculating mind, must get through the public’s rage over six-figure price tags for breakthrough drugs and yet keep Pfizer’s pricing power more or less intact. Doing so is absolutely critical: 34% of Pfizer’s revenue growth over the past three years has come from increasing prices on existing drugs, according to SSR, a Stamford, Conn.-based consulting firm. New medicines, especially for cancer, are selling for $100,000-plus–prices that were unimaginable five years ago." In January 2019, Albert Bourla succeeded Read as CEO at Pfizer. In September 2019, Pfizer announced Read would retire as executive chairman at the end of 2019, ending a four-decade career there.

Personal life Read has a holiday home near Bonita Springs, Florida.