People, December, 2011

Mover of the month

Lilly_Thomas_Thorp

Lilly UK has promoted Thomas Thorp to senior director of corporate affairs at the age of 32. He will lead all of Lilly’s UK corporate affairs activity, including government affairs, Health Technology Assessment and health outcomes, market access and a field-based payer team. He joined Lilly in 2007 as European government affairs manager working in Brussels and from 2008 to 2011 led the company’s government and external affairs activity in the UK. Prior to joining Lilly, he worked at GlaxoSmithKline and then Novartis in government affairs roles.

Guido Rasi has officially started as head of the European Medicines Agency (EMA). Rasi was previously director-general of the Italian Medicines Agency for three years, during which time he also served as a member of the EMA’s management board. Rasi has a degree in medicine and surgery. From 1978 to 1990 he worked as a physician and then in research at the Institute for Experimental Medicine of the National Research Council in Rome, directing the molecular medicine section from 2002 to 2005 and the Tor Vegata section from 2005 to 2008. Michael Lenihan has been brought in as the EMA’s new head of sector for finance and budget. Previously, he was vice president and chief financial officer for 10 years at French retail organisation Hygena Cuisines and has worked in Ireland, the UK and France.

Genzyme

Genzyme has appointed leaders for its core multiple sclerosis (MS) and rare diseases businesses. William ‘Bill’ Sibold (left) will head the MS business and Rogério Vivaldi will lead rare diseases. Sibold has more than 20 years of experience in the biopharmaceutical industry, including eight years at Biogen Idec where he worked on MS products Avonex and Tysabri. He joins Genzyme from Avanir Pharmaceuticals, where he was the chief commercial officer. Vivaldi has been with Genzyme since 1997 and was president of the company’s renal and endocrinology business. He previously served as senior vice president and president of Genzyme Latin America.

Teva UK has promoted its commercial operations officer Richard Daniell to managing director. He takes over from Dipankar Bhattacharjee who has, in turn, been promoted to a wider European role at the company that will see the UK form one of the territories under his guidance. Daniell has spent more than 20 years working within the Teva group of companies. Prior to becoming commercial operations manager in 2009 he was a senior director at Teva UK and before that spent two-and-a-half years as director of generics at IVAX Pharmaceuticals UK.

Teva_UK_Richard_Daniell

Grunenthal_Claas_Jan-Uwe

German pharma company Grünenthal has appointed Jan-Uwe Claas to lead its UK subsidiary. He joins Grünenthal UK from the company’s head office in Aachen, Germany, where he served as senior VP marketing Europe and Australia. Prior to spending almost 10 years with Grünenthal, Claas worked with J&J Pharmaceuticals for more than five years in different commercial functions. He takes over as general manager of Grünenthal UK and Ireland from Chris Matijasevic who is retiring.

Jens Peter Balling is to lead a new regulatory unit set up by Danish pharma company Lundbeck. It will focus on regulatory product support, patient safety and quality assurance of clinical research. Balling has been appointed vice president of regulatory affairs, pharmacovigilance and clinical quality assurance within the company’s R&D operations. He has been with Lundbeck since 2006, when he joined as divisional director of global pharmacovigilance. He previously worked for Novo Nordisk and Nycomed. He will be joined in the new unit by Iman Barilero, also newly appointed as vice president of regulatory development strategy and policy.

Lundbeck

Dominic Tyer has joined PMGroup as managing editor for Pharmaceutical Market Europe (PME) and its website PMLiVE. He has more than 12 years’ experience in publishing, covering pharma, biotech and health and over the last couple of years has developed a particular focus on the pharmaceutical industry’s use of digital technologies.

Joachim Christ is to join Merck KGaA as head of corporate controlling in January 2012. He will report to the German pharma company’s chief financial officer Matthias Zachert. Christ began his industry career at Hoechst, and later its successor company Aventis. He joins Merck from Lanxess, where he has worked since December 1, 2004, leading corporate controlling at the speciality chemicals company.

AstraZeneca (AZ) has made two senior appointments in its US business. Rich Fante becomes regional VP, Americas and Marion McCourt becomes chief operating officer. Fante was already responsible for leading AZ’s commercial operations in North America and he will retain his existing responsibilities as president of the company’s US business. McCourt, currently president and chief executive at AZ Canada, will be responsible for day-to-day operations.

Timothy Wright has been promoted to global head, development at Novartis Pharmaceuticals. Wright has been with Novartis since 2004 and his most recent role was as senior VP and global head of translational sciences at the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research (NIBR). Prior to joining Novartis he worked for Pfizer Global Research and Development.

Pamela Carroll has joined Swiss pharmaceutical company Roche as global head of pathways biology in its Pharma Research and Early Development unit. Carroll will also act as oncology discovery site head at Roche’s Nutley, New Jersey research facility. She first joined the pharma industry in 1999, taking up a position in applied genomics at Bristol-Myers Squibb, and subsequently moved to Merck Research Laboratories.

The UK BioIndustry Association (BIA) has appointed Glyn Edwards as interim chief executive. He was CEO of Antisoma from 1998-2011. Prior to joining Antisoma he worked in a variety of business development roles in the biotech and healthcare industries. He was also a member of the BIA Board. Mr Edwards has a BSc in Biochemistry from Bristol University and an MSc in Economics from the London Business School.

London-based biotech Silence Therapeutics has appointed Dr Georg Buchner VP, business development. He was formerly VP of Corporate & Business Development at Novacta Biosystems and prior to that business development director at Haptogen. During that time he was instrumental in the sale of the Haptogen business to Wyeth, now part of Pfizer, in 2007.

UK-based Destiny Pharma has appointed ex-Pfizer research head Dr David Roblin as medical director. He led Pfizer’s European research operations based in Sandwich, Kent until March 2011. He brings 15 years’ experience in senior R&D roles at Pfizer and Bayer and five years’ experience of medical practice. Dr Roblin will be joined at Destiny by Sir Nigel Rudd, the former head of BAA and ex-chief of Boots.

Management consultancy Idea Pharma has appointed Amy Wasserman and Calum Graham. Wasserman joins Idea Pharma as director of client value (US) after more than four years at Astellas Pharma US and, before that, positions at Janssen-Ortho and Solvay. Graham has over 20 years’ pharma experience, including two years with Xention as director of business development.