George Rathmann

George Blatz Rathmann (1927–2012) was an American chemist, biologist, pioneer in biotechnology and corporate executive. In 1980 he co-founded and served as the first CEO of Amgen, and later founded Icos.

Rathmann was born on December 25, 1927, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. His mother was Edna Blatz, from the family who ran the Valentin Blatz Brewing Company. His father was Louis Rathmann, who worked in various local businesses. He was drawn to science and was inspired by an older brother and brother-in-law who were chemists, and by Mr. Leker, his high school chemistry teacher at Milwaukee University School (where his grandfather had taught years before). He had originally planned to attend medical school, before switching to physical chemistry and obtained a B.S. degree in physical chemistry at Northwestern University in three years, then earning a Ph.D. at Princeton in 1951, by which time he had already been recruited by 3M as a research chemist, where he worked for twenty-one years, helping develop Scotchgard and rising from scientist to corporate manager.

Rathmann left 3M in 1972 to become president of Litton Medical Systems, but was dis-satisfied and left in 1975 to join Abbott Laboratories as vice president of research and development in the diagnostics division. At Abbott, Rathmann became interested in recombinant DNA and other aspects of biotechnology, and was recruited in 1980 by venture capitalists to help found Amgen, where he would serve as chairman, president and CEO.

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