About a year after AstraZeneca took over MedImmune in a $15.6 billion buyout, MedImmune CEO David Mott is leaving the firm at the end of July. AstraZeneca said June 26 that Mott is stepping down for personal reasons, having spent 16 years helping to build Gaithersburg, Md.-based MedImmune.

Tony Zook, CEO of the Anglo/Swiss pharma's North American business and vice president of global marketing, will assume Mott's duties until a successor is hired.

The buyout plan was made public last April (¹ Also see "AstraZeneca Accelerates Biologics Strategy With Acquisition Of MedImmune" - Pink Sheet, 23 April, 2007.). AstraZeneca decided to run its biologics research apart from small molecules.

Cambridge Antibody Technology, acquired earlier, was folded into MedImmune, and CAT then was run by Mott as well (² Also see "Purrfect Fit: AstraZeneca’s CAT Curls Up With MedImmune" - Pink Sheet, 29 October, 2007.).

Since those acquisitions, AstraZeneca biologics have been moving forward. In late January, MedImmune filed a BLA for its next-generation respiratory syncytial virus therapy Numax (motavizumab) as a follow-on to Synagis (palivizumab) (³ Also see "MedImmune Files BLA For Pediatric RSV Candidate" - Pink Sheet, 4 February, 2008.).

AstraZeneca's assets in biologics are also being transferred into MedImmune.

- Randall Osborne (r.osborne@elsevier.com)

MedImmune’s CEO Stepping Down

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