Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Millennium adds new execs Thom and Mercier

By Mass High Tech Staff

Growing pharmaceutical firm Millennium: The Takeda Oncology Co. has added two new senior executives in Claire Thom, senior vice president, portfolio management, and Isabelle Mercier, vice president, marketing.

Thom brings 20 years of drug development and new product planning experience to her position, including product planning in Takeda Pharmaceutical Co.’s oncology, urology and gynecology sectors. She also held senior research and development roles at Takeda Global Research & Development and Takeda Pharmaceutical Co. in Japan.

Thom earned a bachelor of pharmacy degree and doctorate of pharmacy from the University of Illinois, Chicago.

Working off her 16 years of pharmaceutical marketing experience, Mercier will develop and market Millennium’s late-phase products and oncology-related products nationally and globally. Prior to joining Millennium, she worked as vice president of taxotere marketing at sanofi-aventis.

Mercier earned her bachelor of science degrees in biochemistry and clinical biology from Universites Catholiques in Lyon, France; bachelor of science degree in genetic and cellular biology from l’Universite Lyon I in Lyon, France; and an advanced degree in biotechnologies from Universites Catholiques.

Millennium announced last month that it plans to increase its head count by 30 percent, adding up to 300 people by the end of the year. According to Stephen Gansler, senior vice president of human resources at Millennium, most of the new staff is expected to be on the scientific side and will likely be recruited from the Greater Boston area.

The news comes at a time when pharma giants such as Pfizer Inc., Amgen Inc. and Schering-Plough Inc. have made drastic cuts. Schering-Plough announced plans to cut 5,500 jobs in April after questions were raised about its cholesterol-lowering drug, Vytorin. Amgen dropped 2,500 employees last year.

Millennium now employs about 1,000 workers, the majority of whom are based out of its Cambridge headquarters.