Merck is looking for stability at the top of its human health business after turnover in the past year.
Frank Clyburn, who most recently served as president of the human health business, last month announced he would depart to take the CEO role at IFF, a New York-based maker of ingredients for food, fragrances and health products.
Clyburn hadn’t yet served a year in the position. He took over in March 2021 from Michael Nally, who himself left for a CEO job at another company.
The New Jersey-based drugmaker has been rebuilding its leadership team after the departure of long-time CEO Kenneth Frazier and research chief Roger Perlmutter in 2021. While the company is conducting an external search for its new Human Health International chief, its other choices show a willingness to promote from within.
Garay has been with the company since 2006 and previously led pharmaceutical global marketing, commercial analytics and digital marketing. Oosthuizen, who formerly helmed Merck’s business in Japan as well as oncology operations in the Asia Pacific and Latin America, has worked at the company since 2014 after a two-decade career at Eli Lilly.
Khanna, meanwhile, has been at Merck since 1988, working his way up from field sales to top roles in the oncology business. The three executives will assume their human health posts as of Feb. 28. They will sit on the executive team and report directly to CEO Robert Davis, Merck said.
By Kristin Jensen
Source: biopharmadive.com
The companies will explore opportunities to apply Flagship’s innovative bioplatforms – an ecosystem that currently comprises 41 companies – to scientific challenges in disease areas within cardiometabolic and rare diseases and initiate research programmes based on these.
BD is expanding its long-running partnership with the blood collection company Babson Diagnostics. The two companies have been working together since 2019 on a device that can gather small volumes of blood from the capillaries in the fingertip without requiring any specialized training, and beginning with a focus on supporting primary care in retail settings.
Wednesday, Australian biotech CSL said (PDF) the regulatory review of its $11.7 billion acquisition of Switzerland’s Vifor Pharma will take “a few more months,” suggesting it won’t be able to close the transaction by June 2022 as previously expected.
