Lorus Therapeutics (Toronto) has appointed Avanish Vellanki (right) as chief business officer and Gregory K. Chow (below, right) as CFO. Vellanki was mostly recently a senior vice president in investment banking at Wedbush Securities, covering the biotech sector. Previously, he served as senior director of corporate development of Proteolix, which was acquired by Onyx Pharmaceuticals. Chow was previously managing director and head of the private placements team in the life sciences investment banking group at Wedbush Securities.

“Mr. Vellanki and Mr. Chow represent critical additions to the team at this pivotal point in the company's transition in leadership and focus,” says Lorus chairman and CEO William G. Rice. “Avanish brings considerable experience from the life science and banking industries that will boost our abilities to build and advance our oncology pipeline and identify new markets for Lorus' platform. Greg brings impressive corporate finance and capital raising experience for life science companies, as well as deep industry relationships essential to establishing a foundation for Lorus' value and future growth.”

Calico, the anti-aging company launched by Google (Mountain View, CA, USA) and headed by former Genentech CEO Arthur Levinson, has named the following to its management team: Hal Barron, a former Genentech scientist who most recently served as executive vice president, head of global product development and chief medical officer of Hoffmann-La Roche, will be president, R&D; David Botstein, director of Princeton University's Lewis-Sigler Institute and former chairman of genetics at Stanford University, will be CSO; Bob Cohen, most recently senior oncology fellow at Genentech, will be a Calico fellow, in a role that will span R&D and business development; and Cynthia Kenyon, director of the Hillblom Center for the Biology of Aging at University of California, San Francisco, will be senior scientific advisor.

Ton Berkien has joined Nuevolution (Copenhagen) as chief business officer. He was most recently senior director, corporate development, at Takeda Pharmaceuticals International. Prior to Takeda, he held a similar position at Nycomed Pharmaceuticals.

Igenica (Burlingame, CA, USA) has announced the appointment of Gwen A. Fyfe as an independent member of the company's board of directors. She brings more than 20 years of drug development experience, most recently at Genentech (now part of the Roche Group), where she served as vice president, oncology development and vice president, Avastin franchise team. She currently serves on the boards of Array BioPharma and Infinity Pharmaceuticals.

Fred Kavli, founder and chairman of The Kavli Foundation, passed away on November 21 at the age of 86. An inventor, entrepreneur and philanthropist, he made his fortune in industrial, automotive and aeronautical sensors before establishing The Kavli Foundation in 2000 to advance science for the benefit of humanity. The Foundation started an international program of conferences, symposia, endowed professorships and the biennial Kavli Prizes, which recognize scientists for seminal advances in the fields of astrophysics, nanoscience and neuroscience.

Novasep (Pompey, France) has announced the appointment of Nadege Laborde (right) as president of its industrial biotech business unit. Laborde joined Novasep in 2000 as a project manager. Since 2009 she has served as head of the system engineering and construction department.

Yong-Jun Liu has been appointed the head of research of MedImmune, the biologics R&D arm of AstraZeneca. He previously served as vice president and CSO at the Baylor Research Institute and director of the Baylor Institute for Immunology Research.

Amir London has been appointed to the newly created position of senior vice president, business development at Kamada (Ness Ziona, Israel). He was most recently COO of Fidelis Diagnostics. He also previously served as CEO of Promedico.

Gregory T. Lucier has been named to the board of directors of medical device company NuVasive (San Diego). Lucier is chairman and CEO of Life Technologies, which recently agreed to be acquired by Thermo Fisher Scientific.

Bio-Rad Laboratories (Hercules, CA, USA) has named Robert M. Malchione to its board of directors. Malchione was senior vice president, corporate strategy and technology at Avery Dennison from 2000 to 2011 and prior to that, served as vice president, director and partner at Boston Consulting Group.

Linda M. Richardson has been appointed chief commercial officer of Chimerix (Durham, NC, USA). She brings more than 25 years of pharmaceutical sales and marketing experience, previously serving as vice president and head of the global lixisenatide franchise at Sanofi.

Halozyme Therapeutics (San Diego) has announced the appointment of Helen Torley as president, CEO and a member of the board of directors, succeeding founder Gregory I. Frost, who is departing Halozyme for Intrexon. Torley was most recently executive vice president and chief commercial officer at Onyx Pharmaceuticals.

Robert Ward has been appointed president, CEO and a member of the board of directors of Radius Health (Cambridge, MA, USA), succeeding C. Richard Lyttle, who has been serving as interim president and CEO. Lyttle will continue in his role as chairman of Radius' scientific advisory board. Ward has over 26 years of pharma industry experience. He was most recently head of strategy and alliances, new opportunities at AstraZeneca.