ABL named a successor to its previous CEO, Syneos has two new hires, and BTS Research appointed a VP to push its growth model. These, among other people on the move this month.
Also, a new hire at Exostar is looking to bring the company’s supply chain solutions – historically used in the aerospace and defense industries – to life science and health care customers.
Click through the following slides to hear what this month's new hires hope to achieve in their new roles.
ABL named a successor to its previous CEO, Syneos has two new hires, and BTS Research appointed a VP to push its growth model. These, among other people on the move this month.
Also, a new hire at Exostar is looking to bring the company’s supply chain solutions – historically used in the aerospace and defense industries – to life science and health care customers.
Click through the following slides to hear what this month's new hires hope to achieve in their new roles.
The pharmaceutical contract manufacturer and packager has hired Brisco Harward as director of technical and quality services, and Kathryn Weingart as vice president of quality.
Harward has more than 25 years of pharmaceutical industry experience and earned his PhD in analytical chemistry from the University of Tennessee.
“I see my role as helping to grow the business by facilitating the transfer and commercialization of new products at Pharma Tech Industries,” he told us.
“The company has a strong customer focus and understanding of FDA-compliant CMO business parameters. I am excited about how we must challenge our traditional thinking and re-invent ourselves in the future.”
Weingart joins Pharma Tech with more than 30 years of quality assurance, regulatory, and technical operations experience. She has held positions at Qualitest, Pfizer, Cardinal Health, and Procter & Gamble.
“My role is to evaluate and leverage our current quality systems, processes and personnel to ensure that the company is set up for future growth. Pharma contract manufacturing firms must be able to flex to the ebbs and flows of the business,” Weingart told us.
“The quality systems and processes must be able to meet those changes and ensure our products are delivered with the highest of quality standards.”
Pharma Tech also named Mike Greene to the role of plant manager at the company’s Union, MO facility.
“I’m very excited about the growth potential for the Union, MO site,” Greene told us.
“I see our future success dependent on ensuring we reinforce safe behaviors that will sustain our 0 RIR [recordable incident rate] trend, team building events, lots of time invested on the shop floor and manager led GEMBA.”
Greene said he is looking forward to leading continuous improvement activities that will enable the company to be “more nimble, gain production capacity through efficiencies, and allow seamless execution of customer business projects.”
Syneos has appointed a new general counsel and corporate secretary, in addition to a chief accounting officer (CAO), Jonathan Olefson and Robert Parks, respectively.
Olefson will lead Syneos Health’s global legal, compliance, and quality functions as the general counsel and corporate secretary, a role in which he will report directly to CEO Alistair Macdonald.
Prior to Syneos, Olefson was the senior vice president, general counsel and secretary of Cotiviti Holdings. Before this, he held a similar role at Cognizant Technology Solutions.
Parks joins Syneos from Iqvia, where he was the senior vice president, corporate controller and principal accounting officer. In his new role he will oversee shared services, SEC reporting, SOX compliance and accounting policies/research, reporting to Syneos Health CFO Jason Meggs.
Prior to Iqvia, Parks served in leadership roles TMX Finance, Allscripts, and N.E.W. Customer Service.
Günter Stetter has been promoted to vice president, global regulatory affairs study start up.
In his new role, Stetter said his main goal is global harmonization.
"Regulatory requirements are significantly different in each of the countries and regions in which CTI is active, and each of our regional regulatory teams currently do a great job of navigating the processes and requirements for our partners," he told us.
"My goal is to work with all of our teams together on a global level to further improve upon our processes and identify ways to make the submission processes even faster and more efficient.
"I anticipate a lot of challenging activities as I take on the role, such as the ramifications of Brexit and the implementation of EU Regulation 536/2014, but I have a wonderful team of talented people working with me and I am looking forward to these challenges.”
Stetter has been with CTI since 2010 and has more than 30 years of clinical, academic, and industry experience. Before his time at CTI, he was the director of clinical operations at AAIPharma Deutschland GmbH & Co. KG Neu-Ulm.
He has also worked for Rentschler Biotechnologie GmbH and Rentschler Arzneimittel GmbH & Co. KG.
Stuart Itkin has been hired to oversee all of Exostar’s strategic and tactical product management and marketing activities.
“In just a few short years, Exostar has gone from having no presence in the life science and health care industries to serving half of the 20 largest global pharmaceutical firms,” noted Itkin.
“I see great opportunity to accelerate speed-to-market for new drugs and therapies and ultimately enable better patient outcomes by enabling participants in communities of interest to privately, compliantly, and confidently seek, share, and acquire the valuable information they need in a timely fashion,” he added.
Itkin told us his goal as vice president of product management is to extend the reach of the company’s solutions by making them easier to use and higher performing, “and augmenting them with compelling new capabilities that leverage emerging technologies like AI, machine learning, and IoT.”
He would also like to bring Exostar’s supply chain management solutions – which have historically been used in the aerospace and defense industries – to the company’s current and future life science and health care customers.
Itkin is an advisory board member at several early-stage cybersecurity businesses and is a mentor at the seed accelerator MACH37.
Mark Crane is the new vice president of business development at the preclinical CRO.
In this role, Crane will be taking on the company’s marketing, sales, and business development efforts “pushing BTS’s business growth model and fostering positive relationships with new and current clients,” according to BTS. He also will focus on pushing BTS’s toxicology capabilities.
SRG is a science, clinical, and engineering recruitment agency. The company this month announced a new operational leadership team.
According to the UK-based company, the moves were designed to “harness the power of its senior talent and enable the company to create a strong platform for sustainable growth.”
As part of this, Richard Acton (pictured) has moved into the role of director of synergy, and Robin Aris, SRG’s client solutions and development director, joins Acton to focus on developing Synergy’s footprint.
Acton told us, “Over the next 2 years I am looking to maximize the potential of this great business by establishing an enhanced service excellence proposition and associated metrics while also looking to develop a best in class employee engagement program that supports our employees on client sites through continued professional development.”
Joining from Catalent Micron Technologies – where she led the quality control and quality assurance teams – Gaelle Gibbs has been appointed as operations manager.
“Our new flexible work model will be the greatest opportunity for any candidate on the market that wishes to learn, develop, and expose themselves to many techniques and technologies, and be exposed to different ways of working across multiple leading pharmaceutical companies in various countries,” said Gibbs. “For Synergy clients to have access to that flexible resources at hand reach whenever needed is fantastic.”
The CRO announced that its principal programmer/analyst and statistical programming operational service lead Kristen Harrington has been appointed to president of SESUG, a regional users group (RUG) for users of SAS Software. Her appointment term begins January 1, 2019.
“SESUG’s goal has always been to promote education, knowledge sharing, and networking within the SAS user community of the southeast,” said Harrington.
“From our grant programs directed at supporting students, faculty, and new professionals to our internal mentoring program for rising conference chairs within the Executive Council, we strive to support all levels of career growth and development.
She told us, “Stepping into the role as president of SESUG, I aspire to continue the outstanding work of those who came before me and focus on engaging an even more diverse population within our community to share their ideas, learn from each other, and support one another in our continued career growth.”
Lonza this month announced the appointment of Allen Burgenson, global subject matter expert for endotoxin detection at Lonza, as chair of the Horseshoe Crab Advisory Panel of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC).
Burgenson was elected by his peers to this position in recognition of more than 35 years of experience in the biomedical use of horseshoe crabs.
The appointment follows Burgenson’s 10-year long service as a member of the Horseshoe Crab Advisory Panel, a role in which the Governor’s Office of Maryland appointed to him.