Teva conducts boardroom shuffle with four new faces

It is well-known that Teva Pharmaceutical has had a rough time of late, particularly in terms of employees. It has gone through three CEOs in only five years and sparked the ire of its workforce by mooting big cuts to the number of employees across the business.

Now, it has sought to begin a new era in leadership by bringing in four new faces to boardroom level. The prospective new board members would be Murray Goldberg, former CFO of Regeneron, Perry Nissen, former GSK R&D official, Chemi Peres, a managing partner of Pitango Venture Capital, and Roberto Mignone, a managing partner at hedge fund Bridger Management.

As can be noted, the two former appointments would arrive at the company with previous experience working in the pharmaceutical industry – something that has become a focal point for shareholder discussions to move the company forward.

The four appointments will still need to be approved by shareholders at the company’s annual meeting.

"These directors will join a board that has already gone through very significant transformation since 2014 with the addition of highly qualified and talented directors, including individuals with global pharmaceutical and financial experience," Sol Barer said in a statement to shareholders.

Barer, himself, will be standing to be re-nominated as Chairman of the company at the same meeting where the prospective board members will be voted on.

The larger overriding appointment that Teva is desperate to fill is the position of CEO. There have already been strong suggestions that the company is looking for an experienced pharma CEO and will look outside its tradition for hiring Israelis for the job.

The list of issues for the incoming CEO to address is a long one and many could see the role as something of a poisoned chalice. The company’s habit of jettisoning CEOs will certainly not be of much assurance to anyone incoming to the role, on top of the larger challenges of the company’s burgeoning debt and patent losses to Copaxone.