Joseph Jimenez: Stewarding Novartis

Joseph Jimenez has been the CEO of Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis since 2010. Prior to this he was the Division Head, Novartis Pharmaceuticals. His performance as head of this division is noteworthy probably helping him secure the top post.

Jimenez spearheaded the transformation of the pharmaceutical portfolio to balance mass market and specialty products as well as significantly increased the percentage of sales for newly launched products. He also worked to realign the division’s commercial approach to concentrate on the individual requirements of customers and integrated more technology to better link with patients and customers.

It can’t be said that Jimenez is a company man.  He started working at Novartis in April 2007 as Division Head, Novartis Consumer Health.  Before that he was the president and CEO of the North America business for H.J.  Heinz Co., and as president and CEO of Heinz in Europe from 2002 to 2006.  Jimenez was also a nonexecutive director of AstraZeneca PLC, United Kingdom, from 2002 to 2007.

With the changing environment he sees China, Russia and Africa as new markets for growth. Jimenez also believes big data will have a lot of impact on research and new discoveries.