The European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (Brussels) has announced the designation of Christopher A. Viehbacher (right), CEO of Sanofi, as its new president-elect beginning in June 2013 for a two-year term. Viehbacher is also chairman of Genzyme, which Sanofi acquired in February 2011. He was chairman of the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America from December 2010 to April 2012 and is currently chairman of the CEO Roundtable on Cancer.

“Chris Viehbacher is well placed to take over the leadership of EFPIA,” says director general Richard Bergström. “At this time, it is important to remind ourselves and others what is needed to sustain research based pharmaceuticals in Europe. Chris was involved in the high-level group G10 Medicines and has shown his ability to engage with policy-makers worldwide. I look forward to working with him.”

Drug delivery company Tris Pharma (Monmouth Junction, NJ, USA) has named Jonathan Berlent vice president of business development. He was most recently president of Granules USA.

Immatics Biotechnologies (Tübingen, Germany) has announced the appointment of Peter Chambré as chairman of the board of directors, replacing Thomas Widmann, who had been chairman since 2004. Chambré was CEO of Cambridge Antibody Technology from 2002 to 2006 and before that, was COO of Celera Genomics. He currently holds chairman and board roles with a number of companies.

Rheonix (Ithaca, NY, USA) has elected Bill Colston to its board of directors. Colston was formerly CEO of genetic analysis system developer QuantaLife until its acquisition by Bio-Rad Laboratories in 2011.

Stephen A. Hill has been appointed president, CEO and a member of the board of directors of Targacept (Winston-Salem, NC, USA). He brings over 20 years of industry experience, having served previously as president and CEO of Solvay Pharmaceuticals and ArQule.

David L. Lacey has been appointed to the board of arGEN-X (Breda, The Netherlands and Ghent, Belgium). He has over 30 years of basic and clinical research experience, and was formerly senior vice president and head of discovery research at Amgen.

Richard Lerner has been named chairman of the governing board of the new Shanghai Institute for Advanced Immunochemical Studies (Shanghai). Sponsored by Shanghai Tech University and the Shanghai Advanced Research Institute under the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the new institute marks China's first attempt to establish a world-class center of antibody research. It will identify targets and develop antibodies to treat cancer as well as infectious, autoimmune and metabolic diseases. Lerner is the former president and CEO of the Scripps Research Institute. He stepped down in January 2012 after having led Scripps for 25 years.

The Alliance for Regenerative Medicine (Washington, DC, USA) has elected Geoff MacKay, president and CEO of Organogenesis, as its next chair and Keith Murphy, chairman and CEO of Organovo, as vice chair. Ed Field, COO of Cytomedix, and Martin McGlynn, president and CEO of StemCells, were elected to the two other officer positions. MacKay will replace Gil Van Bokkelen, chairman and CEO of Athersys, who will complete his two-year term as chair on December 31, 2012.

Mammen P. “Anza” Mammen, Jr. has been named vice president, clinical vaccines at Vical (San Diego). He recently completed a 21-year career in the Army's medical corps, retiring as a colonel and recipient of the Legion of Merit and serving as infectious disease consultant and chief, pandemic warning team at the US Department of Defense, Fort Detrick, Maryland. From 2006 to 2010, he served as the Army's product manager for vaccines in advanced development against dengue, hepatitis E, and HIV viruses for the US Army Medical Research and Materiel Command, Fort Detrick, Maryland.

Pathwork Diagnostics (Redwood City, CA, USA) has named Lee R. McCracken as CEO. McCracken, already a board member, has over 20 years of experience in the life sciences. He has served as head of business development at Prometheus Laboratories as well as senior vice president of pharmaceutical business development at Diversa.

Definiens (Munich) has named Gerald Möller chairman of its supervisory board. Möller spent 23 years at Boehringer Mannheim where he held a number of leadership positions, culminating in his appointment as CEO in 1995. Following the company's acquisition by Roche, he became head of global development and strategic marketing, pharmaceuticals, and a member of the executive committee at Hoffmann La Roche. He also serves as chairman of the board at Morphosys and sits on the boards of Illumina, Bionostics and Vivacta.

Heptares Therapeutics (Welwyn Garden City, UK) has elected Roger M. Perlmutter, former executive vice president, R&D at Amgen, to its board of directors as a nonexecutive director. Perlmutter was at Amgen from 2001 until his retirement earlier this year.

Jonathan Turner has been appointed managing director and CEO of Caprotec Bioanalytics (Berlin). He joins the company from technology developer and equity firm XL Techgroup, where he was senior vice president. His previous positions include corporate head of business development and licensing at Boehringer Ingelheim, global director of respiratory and inflammation discovery alliances at AstraZeneca and departmental head of central nervous system research at Schering. As CEO, Turner succeeds founder Hubert Köster, who will continue as acting CSO and chairman of Caprotec's scientific advisory board.

NovAliX (Strasbourg, France) has appointed Luc Van Hijfte as CSO of drug discovery. Van Hijfte joins the company from Janssen, a Johnson & Johnson company, where he served as head of medicinal chemistry EU.