Big Phar­ma R&D leg­end Paul Stof­fels is trad­ing his J&J ti­tle for the CEO role at one of the most deeply trou­bled biotechs in the in­dus­try

Af­ter 20 years work­ing at the pin­na­cle of Big Phar­ma R&D, tak­ing lead roles in J&J’s pipeline re­vamp and a quick­ly de­vel­oped, one-shot Covid vac­cine that is be­ing sold around the world, it turns out the leg­endary Paul Stof­fels has at least one more chap­ter ahead in his ca­reer.

And this one will be the biggest chal­lenge the 59-year-old has faced yet.

Af­ter the mar­ket closed Wednes­day, the long­time sci­en­tist was of­fi­cial­ly named as the new CEO of Gala­pa­gos, a trou­bled biotech try­ing to un­der­go a facelift in the wake of a dis­as­trous al­liance with Gilead that end­ed with the im­plo­sion of a drug pro­gram billed as one of the in­dus­try’s next big block­buster sto­ries.

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