Recent Industry Personnel News

MDS Pharma Services, a contract research organization (CRO) based in King of Prussia, Pa. has named James Pusey as the company’s vice president and general manager of its global clinical development business. The group manages MDS’ late stage trials. Prior to MDS, Pusey was chief executive officer at the biotech company OrthoLogic. He also served as executive vice president for neurology at Serono and a vice president of marketing at AstraZeneca’s CNS, Pain and Infection group.

UK-based eClinical company ClinPhone appointed Michael Smyth to the position of vice president of product management for the company’s Trial Management Solutions Group. He will be based at ClinPhone’s East Windsor, N.J. office. Prior to joining ClinPhone, Smyth was director of business development at Premier Research and more recently the head of global strategic accounts at VivoMetrics.

Wilmington, N.C.-based CRO PPD named William Sharbaugh as the company’s new chief operations officer. Prior to joining PPD, Sharbaugh was vice president of global development at Bristol-Myers-Squibb and held various positions at Merck & Co. more than 10 years. Recently, the company’s chief financial and accounting officer Linda Baddour announced her resignation. She was with the company for 11 years. Until a replacement can be found, PPD has promoted Peter Wilkinson to vice president of finance and chief accounting officer and Brian Tuttle to vice president of finance and corporate controller.

Clinsys Clinical Research, a Berkeley Heights, N.J.-based CRO, has hired three new executives for the company’s management team. Clinsys appointed Anthony Abruzzini, Ph.D., as vice president of global regulatory services. Prior to Clinsys, Abruzzini was senior vice president of regulatory services at INC Research and held various positions at Quintiles and Encelle. Clinsys named Linda Patricia Miller, M.D., as the company’s chief medical officer. Miller previously held positions of director of clinical research at Eisai and associate director of clinical development at Organon. The company also named John Hogan, MPM, to the position of CNS project director. He has held similar positions at Sepracor and INC Research.

Boston, Mass.-based CRO Parexel International appointed Joe Avellone, M.D., to the position of corporate vice president of clinical research operations in both North and Latin America. Avellone was formerly the chief executive officer at Veritas Medicine. He also served as chief operating officer for BlueCross BlueShield of Massachusetts.