Conor McKechnie

Vice President Marketing, Cytiva

A prolific reader, Conor McKechnie is known for choosing precisely the right books to send to colleagues for insight and inspiration. He brings that talent for pinpointing needs and offering solutions into his relationships with customers.

As VP Marketing for Cytiva, Conor leads a team of marketers along the wire between being new and exciting, while ensuring consistency and stability for customers in the life sciences industry. He’s been in the role since March 2016, but his career in marketing, communications and public affairs spans more than 18 years.

Before becoming VP Marketing, Conor had served as Chief Communications Officer and Head of Public Affairs for GE Healthcare Life Sciences since 2012. His grasp of the industry’s priorities earned him an appointment in 2014 as director and trustee of CaSE, the UK Campaign for Science and Engineering, where he still serves.

From 2003-2006, Conor served as Communications Lead at GE Consumer Finance in the UK during a turbulent time of consumer re-branding, unprecedented growth, and intense regulatory scrutiny. He moved to GE Healthcare’s Global PR team in 2006 and in 2010 set up GE Healthcare’s Public Affairs unit. Prior to GE, Conor worked in Stockholm, Sweden, with one of the Nordic region’s leading communications agencies. He has previously worked in communications in the UK, telecoms in the Netherlands, and taught at Al-Jubayl Technical University in Saudi Arabia.

Born in Zaire, Conor has lived and worked in Africa, the Netherlands, Brazil, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Italy, Sweden and the UK. A linguist, he has an MA in Philosophy, Psychology and Business from the Universities of Glasgow and University of California Santa Barbara, where his 1996 MA thesis focused on the ethics of virtual reality and emerging technologies.