Sanofi replaces Paul Hudson as CEO with Belén Garijo

Andrew Joseph covers health, medicine and the biopharmaceutical industry in Europe. You can reach Andrew on Signal at drawqjoseph.71.

Sanofi is replacing Paul Hudson as CEO, the company announced Thursday, rejecting his attempts to strengthen the company’s pipeline amid recent clinical setbacks.

The company’s board of directors has chosen Belén Garijo, CEO of Merck KGgA, to become its next general manager. It begins on April 29.

Hudson, who took the reins at Sanofi in 2019, has sought to invest more in the company’s research programs to find a successor to its mega-blockbuster Dupixent, an immunotherapy it markets with Regeneron Pharmaceuticals. That approach has at times worried investors, but Hudson argued that doubling the company’s pipeline would make it an immunology-focused research powerhouse in the years to come, with Dupixent’s patent protection expected to end in the early 2030s.