Changing Faces: Agency, consultancy, and investor hires from March 2023

In March we saw just a handful of hires in the pharma marketing world, including some high-profile appointments.

Two agencies expand C-Suite. Global healthcare marketing firm The Considered has added a new chief experience officer to its roster, tapping design thinking specialist Bam Zahraie. Zahraie most recently served as global innovation lead for health and wellness, life sciences, and biotech clients at Havas NOW/Havas Health & You.

CultHealth, an Indegene subsidiary and full-service advertising and marketing agency for healthcare, also made a C-Suite hire, adding David Stemler as its new chief creative officer. Stemler was previously executive creative director at CDM New York, part of the Omnicom Health Group.

Inizio invests in DEI through hire. Inizio, a full-services life sciences consultancy that provides advisory, medical, marketing, communications, and patient engagement services, has tapped Stefanie Christmas to serve as its new global head of diversity, equity, and inclusion, responsible for spearheading a company-wide DEI strategy. She previously created and ran a DEI effort at Vynamic.

Boyds bolsters regulatory expertise with new hire. Boyds, a global drug development consultancy based in the UK, has tapped Harriet Edwards for the role of associate director of regulatory affairs. Edwards previously led regulatory affairs for Albumedix; before that, she worked at CDMO/CRO Quotient Sciences.

Two strategy firms name new partners, directors. Newmarket Strategy, a UK life sciences consultancy, named Blake Dark, former NHS chief negotiator with the pharma industry, as a senior partner. Newmarket also added David Reith as a director.

Healthcare research firm Day One Strategy also appointed a new partner in Jo McDonald, who brings 20 years of pharma client and agency experience. In addition, Day One announced the hire of oncology researcher Gemma McConnell as research director.

Consultants, investors make board appointments. Several more groups had news about board and team appointments.

• Business consultancy Skarbek, which serves a variety of sectors including life sciences, appointed Ian Pontefract, a 35-year veteran of KPMG, as its new chairman. Previous Chair Sir David Wright will remain on as a senior advisor.
• Biopharma strategy firm Prescient added three new directors to its medical team: Navi Singh Parmar, Michaela Scheiner, and Dr Sanam Sikander-Rehman bring a variety and depth of experience to the London company.
• Mission Street, a pharma investor and operator of lab space, announced two new advisory board members, both investors. Epidarex Capital’s partner Peter Finan and Rosetta Capital’s founder Jonathan Hepple join Tim Funnel on the board.

That’s it for this roundup. Remember, if you’ve had a recent appointment and you work in or around the pharma space, we want to hear about it. Please send your press releases to editorial@pharmaphorum.com for inclusion in future editions of Changing Faces.