REQ XOMA (Berkeley, CA, USA) has announced the appointment of Paul Rubin as vice president and chief medical officer. Company founder Patrick J. Scannon, who had been executive vice president and chief medical officer since March of 2009, will now serve as executive vice president and CSO. Rubin served most recently as chief medical officer at Funxional Therapeutics, as CEO of Resolvyx Pharmaceuticals from 2007 to 2009 and president and CEO of Critical Therapeutics from 2002 to 2007.

“Paul has directed the development of more than ten approved pharmaceutical and biotechnology products, experience that will be instrumental for the advancement of our proprietary pipeline,' says XOMA chairman and CEO Steve B. Engle.

Genus (Basingstoke, UK) has named Eli Lilly executive Karim Bitar CEO, succeeding Richard Wood, who is retiring from the company on September 30. Bitar has been with Eli Lilly for 15 years and currently serves as president of Lilly Europe, Canada and Australia. Wood has been Genus's CEO since December 1996.

Tetragenetics (Cambridge, MA, USA) has named Marco Cacciuttolo (below, right) president and CEO and announced the appointment of Ben Machielse and Robert Gailus to the board of directors. Cacciuttolo, whose previous stops include MedImmune and Medarex, was most recently president and CEO of Percivia. Machielse was recently executive vice president of operations at MedImmune. Gailus joins Tetragenetics's board as an experienced venture capital investor. He is a financial advisor to Ogden-CAP Associates and was a founding member of Schroder Ventures/US, the venture affiliate of Schroders, London.

Corey Goodman and Doug Melton have resigned their positions at stem cell startup iPierian (S. San Francisco, CA, USA), according to the technology daily Xconomy. Goodman, a co-founder of Exelixis and Renovis and formerly head of Pfizer's Biotherapeutics and Bioinnovation Center, was chairman of the board. Melton was an iPierian co-founder and scientific advisor.

Fredrik Lindgren has resigned as CEO of Karo Bio (Huddinge, Sweden). The company has appointed Per Bengtsson as acting president and CEO until a permanent successor is found. Bengtsson was elected to the board of Karo Bio earlier this year and was previously CEO of Probi and R&D manager at Pharmacia/Pharmacia & Upjohn. He is currently a consultant with Mintage Scientific.

Jonathan B. Lloyd Jones has been appointed CFO and vice president of corporate development of TetraLogic Pharmaceuticals (Malvern, PA, USA). He joins the company with over 25 years of corporate development and finance experience at the Royal Bank of Scotland, Genzyme, and most recently as vice president of finance at TransMolecular.

Endocyte (W. Lafayette, IN, USA) has announced the appointment of Binh Nguyen as vice president of clinical affairs, succeeding Richard Messmann. Nguyen has more than 20 years of experience in clinical drug development, most recently as chief medical officer at Tigris Pharmaceuticals.

Xceleron (York, UK) has announced that David Roblin has been appointed to its board of directors and Stuart Best has joined the company as senior director, operations. Roblin joins the board from Pfizer Global R&D, where he was most recently senior vice president R&D, research head and site director. Best was most recently head of bioanalysis at Merck, Scotland.

NovImmune (Plan-Les-Ouates, Switzerland) has named Klaus Strein to its board of directors. Strein was formerly head of pharma at Boehringer Mannheim and Roche, and was instrumental in the formation of the Roche's global division of pharma research and early development (pRED) in early 2010.

Verastem (Cambridge, MA, USA) has announced the appointment of Henri Termeer to its board of directors. Termeer is the former chairman, president and CEO of Genzyme.

Genocea Biosciences (Cambridge, MA, USA) has announced the appointment of Ravi Venkataramani as vice president, business development. He joins Genocea from MedImmune, where he most recently served as director of business development.

Michael D. Webb has joined Allegro Diagnostics (Maynard, MA, USA) as president, CEO and a member of the company's board of directors. He has over 25 years of leadership experience in the biomedical industry, previously serving as the founder, president and CEO of Anchor Therapeutics and president and CEO of EPIX Pharmaceuticals. In addition, he is the executive chairman of Virtify and has served as chairman of the Massachusetts Biotechnology Council.

Marken (London) has named Wesley P. Wheeler as CEO. He succeeds Gerard Barba, who will remain the chairman of the Marken board of directors. Wheeler was previously president and CEO of Patheon and president of Valeant Pharmaceuticals.

Thirty-year industry veteran Frank Witney has been appointed president and CEO at Affymetrix (Santa Clara, CA, USA), succeeding Kevin King, who is resigning to pursue other interests. Witney most recently served as president and CEO of Dionex and oversaw its recent $2.1 billion sale to Thermo Fisher Scientific.

Kevin Young of Gilead Sciences (Foster City, CA, USA) has been appointed a Commander of The British Empire, one of Great Britain's highest civilian honors, in recognition of his “services to the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries, particularly to the development and marketing of life-changing medicines.” Young, who serves as Gilead's executive vice president of commercial operations, is a 28-year veteran of the pharmaceutical and biotech industries. He joined Gilead in 2004 after having worked for Amgen and AstraZeneca.