Pepscan Therapeutics (Lelystad, The Netherlands) has named Michiel Lodder (below, right) as chief business officer. He joins Pepscan from Octoplus, where he held the position of senior manager, business development, responsible for licensing, partnering and alliance management activities.

“We are delighted to bring Michiel Lodder on board to help us exploit the enormous potential of Pepscan's pioneering CLIPS platform for the discovery and development of therapeutic peptides and antibodies,” says Wim Mol, CEO of Pepscan. “Pepscan has recently established a number of research collaboration and licensing agreements with major pharma and biotech companies, and Michiel's business savvy and deal-making experience make him ideal to further expand our partnership base.”

“I'm very excited to join the company at this pivotal stage,” states Lodder. “The potential of the CLIPS technology to significantly improve therapeutic peptide leads or generate antibodies against intractable targets such as G protein–coupled receptors (GPCRs) and ion channels is far reaching. Through successful partnering, Pepscan can play an important role in the advancement of innovative peptide and antibody therapeutics.”

Aegerion Pharmaceuticals (Cambridge, MA, USA) has announced the appointment of Sol J. Barer to its board of directors and as chair of the compensation committee. Barer is the former CEO and current chairman of Celgene. Andrew T. Blair has joined Affymax (Palo Alto, CA, USA) as vice president of medical affairs. He was previously vice president of clinical research for Proteon Therapeutics.

Enlight Biosciences (Boston) has announced Michelle Browner as its new CEO. She is an 18-year veteran at Roche and was most recently global head of emerging science and technologies in the company's partnering group in Basel, Switzerland. Enlight's founding CEO David Steinberg will continue his service on Enlight's board of directors.

Epigenomics (Berlin) has appointed Noel Doheny as CEO of its US subsidiary based in Seattle. He was most recently CEO of OpGen and was previously senior vice president for the molecular diagnostics division of Affymetrix.

Novavax (Rockville, MD, USA) has named chairman Stanley Erck as CEO, succeeding Rahul Singhvi, who had served as CEO for the past 6 years. Erck joined the company in 2010 after serving as CEO at Iomai from 2000 to 2008. He will remain a member of the Novavax board, and current board member James Young, former president of R&D at MedImmune, will become chairman.

Regulus Therapeutics (La Jolla, CA, USA) has named Neil Gibson as its chief scientific officer. Gibson has more than 17 years of pharmaceutical drug development experience, most recently serving as chief scientific officer and oncology therapeutic area head of Pfizer's oncology research unit. He also held leadership roles on Pfizer's oncology business unit leadership team and on the global leadership team of Pfizer's pharmatherapeutics organization.

In conjunction with an investment of $30 million in bluebird bio (Cambridge, MA, USA) by ARCH Venture Partners, Steven Gillis has joined bluebird bio's board of directors. Gillis is a managing director at ARCH. Previously he was a founder and CEO of Corixa and a founder, chief scientific officer and CEO of Immunex.

Roche (Nutley, NJ, USA) has announced that Janet Hammond has joined the company as vice president, translational medicine–virology in pharmaceutical research and early development (pRED). She previously served as chief medical officer and senior vice president of global medical affairs at Valeant Pharmaceuticals.

Privately held Symphogen (Copenhagen) has announced the appointment of Ivan D. Horak as chief scientific/medical officer. He joins the company from Enzon, where he served as chief scientific officer and president of R&D. Symphogen also named Gayle M. Mills, formerly executive vice president of business operations and chief business officer at Roxro Pharma, as chief business officer.

The board of directors of Oxygen Biotherapeutics (Morrisville, NC, USA) has accepted the resignation of president and CEO Richard Kiral. He will complete his term on the board of directors but will not seek re-election during the annual shareholder meeting to be held in September. To ensure a smooth transition, Kiral and the company have entered into a 2-year consulting agreement.

Michael A. Metzger has joined Mersana Therapeutics (Cambridge, MA, USA) as executive vice president and COO. He previously led Forest Laboratories' M&A activities as a senior member of the business development team.

Thomas H. Murray will step down next year as president and CEO of The Hastings Center (Garrison, NY, USA). He came to the bioethics research center as president in 1999 from Case Western Reserve University, where he was director of the Center for Biomedical Ethics in the School of Medicine and the Susan E. Watson Professor of Bioethics. He plans to continue his work on Hastings Center research projects and remain a Hastings Center Fellow.

Agennix (Heidelberg, Germany) has named Steven Simonson as vice president, clinical development, a newly created position. Simonson previously held senior positions at AstraZeneca including senior director, clinical research, infection therapeutic area.

Christoph Westphal is leaving the post of president of SR One (Conshohocken, PA, USA), after leading GlaxoSmithKline's corporate healthcare venture capital fund for just under a year. Westphal was a cofounder and CEO of Sirtris until 2010, guiding the company through its initial public offering in 2007 and acquisition by GSK in 2008. He departs to devote his full attention to Longwood Founders Fund, which he started last spring with ex-Sirtris colleagues Michelle Dipp and Rich Aldrich, though he remains an advisor to GSK as cochair of the Sirtris scientific advisory board. His exact departure date has not been announced.