Biogen’s Board of Directors has elected Caroline Dorsa, a former Merck & Co. executive as the company’s Chair of the Board of Directors, effective June 14, 2023, following the company’s 2023 Annual Meeting of Stockholders. Dorsa will succeed Stelios Papadopoulos, who has served as Chairman of Biogen since 2014, and who announced he would not stand for re-election to the Board. 

Dorsa joined the Biogen Board in 2010. She served as Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Public Service Enterprise Group, a diversified energy company, from 2009 until her retirement in 2015, and served on its Board of Directors from 2003 to 2009. Prior to that, she held various financial and operational positions over her 21 years at Merck & Co., including Senior Vice President, Global Human Health, Strategy and Integration, and Vice President and Treasurer. 

This is a second recent leadership change for Biogen. In November 2022, the company named Christopher A. Viehbacher, formerly CEO of Sanofi, as President and CEO and a member of the Board of Directors. Viehbacher succeeded Michel Vounatsos as Biogen’s CEO, who announced in May 2022 that he would be stepping down as CEO. Vounatsos, who had led Biogen since 2017, announced in May 2022 that he would step down as CEO following lower-than-expected results and diminished prospects for its Alzheimer’s drug, Aduhelm (aducanumab), once touted as a potential blockbuster. The company also announced in May (May 2022) that it would implement a $500-million cost-reduction program, which involved substantially eliminating the commercial infrastructure for the drug. The $500 million was in addition to further cost-reductions announced by the company in December 2021 to bring its total annualized cost-savings to $1 billion. 

Source: Biogen