Franklin R. Cockerill, III

Dr. Frank Cockerill is currently the CEO of FRC3Lab, LLC, a private consulting company for clinical diagnostic testing. His clients include both Fortune 500 and start-up companies. He also carries the academic appointment of Adjunct Professor of Medicine, Rush University Medical Center.

Dr. Cockerill most recently served as the Chief Medical Officer and as a Director of the Board of Analyte Health located in Chicago, Illinois. Prior to that he served as the CEO of Analyte Health and developed a business strategy that led to the addition of service lines beyond the company’s legacy STI business.

During his tenure as CEO, Analyte Health was awarded the “Ten Most Promising Telemedicine Solution Providers of 2017” by Healthcare Tech Outlook and Dr. Cockerill personally received the Halfpenny G-2 Lab Innovation Award (2016) for novel integration of laboratory services into the telehealth ecosystem.

Before joining Analyte Health, Dr. Cockerill was the Chair of the Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology, Mayo Clinic, and President and CEO of Mayo Medical Laboratories (MML). While at Mayo he also carried a named professorship, the Ann and Leo Markin Professor of Medicine and Microbiology at the Mayo Medical School.

Dr. Cockerill is Board Certified in Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases (American Board of Internal Medicine) and Clinical Microbiology (American Board of Pathology). He practiced Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases for over a decade before shifting his focus to Clinical Microbiology. Dr. Cockerill’s research interests have ranged from basic discovery to applied science with a special emphasis on the phenotypic and genotypic identification of antimicrobial resistance.

Dr. Cockerill has authored or co-authored over 150 publications in the medical literature many of which relate to diagnostic testing for infectious diseases. He and his research team at Mayo developed numerous real-time PCR assays, which have significant advantages over conventional culture-based assays, and include the first commercially available rapid PCR test for Anthrax. This work has resulted in 8 US patents, 2 foreign patents, and 56 licensed technologies.

Recently, Dr. Cockerill provided a pivotal role in one of the first clinical studies of self-swabbing for COVID-19 infection in the US. He helped coordinate the swift development and execution of the study, along with the Gates Foundation, Everett Clinic (United Healthcare), and testing laboratories in March 2020. This study resulted in one of the earliest FDA emergency use self-testing methods for COVID-19.

Dr. Cockerill’s current or recent extramural leadership positions include Chair of the Subcommittee on Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing, Clinical Laboratory Standards Institute (CLSI), Chair, Microbiology Devices Panel of the Medical Devices Advisory Committee of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Board Member and Program Director, of the Association for Molecular Pathology (AMP), Director, American Clinical Laboratory Association Board; Director, Board of Scientific Counselors of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Editor, Journal of Clinical Microbiology.

Finally, Dr. Cockerill has received numerous awards, fellowships, and honors including the BD Award for Research in Clinical Microbiology, the G2 Laboratory Public Service National Leadership Award, the G2 Halfpenney Technologies Lab Innovation Award, and Fellowships in the American Academy of Microbiology, Infectious Diseases Society of America, American College of Physicians and American College of Chest Physicians. The BD Award, sponsored by the American Society for Microbiology (ASM), is the highest honor bestowed upon a clinical microbiologist in the United States. The Laboratory Public Service National Leadership recognizes significant contributions to the healthcare of the American public with past recipients including both scientists and US senators and congressmen.