Cognate is not an affiliate of NWBO. They are its manufacture; its clinical vendor. So, I imagine that you would not be forced to sell out of Cognate if it were public because the audit of NWBO is not of Cognate.
Prior to every single consulting job a conflict of interest check request is submitted before the work can begin.. That must be cleared. I doubt a large COI department would have turned down NW Bio work because one of their employees sat on a Board to a competitor of its manufacturing/vendor. That's insane. No one would end up being able to accept any assignment! In fact I'm certain that does not occur. Relationships with Vendors are not considered conflicts. Nor are firm contract with all competitors. Consulting firms work for competitor all the time. (An audit firm will rarely do management consult of the same client; its a conflict (often but not always) to provide advisory consultant to companies of the books you audit.) The COI occurs when consultants over time, as industry experience is obtained by work done on multiple projects, and those projects subject them to COI due to exposure to competitive information. As a firm you first vett the firm, and then you review employee resumes before staffing them on the job(s) - a whole other department for that. And so you to suggest that OP should have turned down the engagement because an employee sat on a Board to a manufacture competitor is not how it works. They would and should have taken the engagement. It was at the staffing point that a "potential" conflict arose. And I doubt it would have been caught unless they were so familiar with all aspects of NWBO. But that would not be the case, as they don't get that information prior to signing the MSA, the SOW, and all the NDAs. If anyone other than KW been on that assignment, there would be no issue. Whatsoever! NDA's were signed. Cognate would not be mentioned in it, but would be protected under it because they were NWBO's vendor. And so they were. OP did the right thing by removing themselves as given the nature of the engagement it would be in poor taste for the firm to continue, because an employee was on a competitive Board that was in litigation. Did you even notice how NWBO poised CP's termination in that press release as "potential" COI. Well that is because technically Cognate it is not an affiliate. The only thing that OP could have done better is research the firm prior to staffing; but I imagine Woodford suggested Wolf completely unaware that she joined a new Board, so staffing may have been determined prior to the MSA.
So yeah, I disagree with you too. :)
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