SK bioscience said on the 21st it appointed Park Jin-seon, Deputy Minister of marketing and business development, as chief operating officer (COO). The chief operating officer oversees the companywide value chain, a newly created role.
Park, a graduate of Seoul National University's College of Pharmacy, is an overseas business expert who served as Deputy Minister of overseas business development and as BD Deputy Minister. Park will oversee everything from research planning to business development, managing preparations for commercializing the pipeline (new drug candidates).
The company appointed Lee Sang-yoon, former head of the Samsung Biologics technical support center, as head of the L House plant and Deputy Minister of bio research. The Deputy Minister will design manufacturing processes from the early research stage with overseas supply in mind. Lee Beom-han, QA group head at Hanmi Pharmaceutical, was hired as QE Deputy Minister. The Deputy Minister has worked in quality assurance for more than 20 years and secured product approvals from agencies including the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
The company said it made the personnel moves to build a control tower where vaccine development, commercial production, and global cooperation work in an integrated manner. SK bioscience is jointly developing a 21-valent pneumococcal vaccine with French drugmaker Sanofi and is conducting global phase 3 trials. A company official said, "We will make a leap in the global vaccine and bio markets through organizational streamlining."