The Nomination Committee of SynAct Pharma (“SynAct”) intends to propose to the Annual General Meeting on May 25, 2023, that the existing board member Uli Hacksell is elected as new Chairman of the Board of Directors and that Thomas von Koch is elected as new member of the Board of Directors.
The Board of Directors of SynAct has resolved to appoint the current Chairman of the Board of Directors, Torbjørn Bjerke, as new CEO effective as from the Annual General Meeting on May 25, 2023. In connection herewith, Torbjørn Bjerke will resign as Chairman and member of the Board of Directors. In view of this, the Nomination Committee has resolved to propose to the Annual General Meeting that the existing Board member Uli Hacksell is elected as the new Chairman of the Board of Directors. The Nomination Committee will further propose that Thomas von Koch is elected as new ordinary Board member and that all other existing Board members, except for Torbjørn Bjerke, are re-elected.
Uli Hacksell has been a member of the SynAct Board of Directors since 2020. He has more than 30 years of experience from executive positions in major pharmaceutical and biotech companies and more than 10 years of experience as the CEO of publicly listed companies. As the CEO of ACADIA Pharmaceuticals from 2000−2015, he led its development from a private start-up to a public, multibillion dollar company. In the 1990s, he held senior positions at Astra AB, prior to which he was a professor of organic chemistry at Uppsala University. He holds a PhD from Uppsala University.
Dr. Hacksell is Chairman of the board of Medivir and Annexin Pharmaceuticals, and a board member of InDex Pharmaceuticals and Active Biotech.
Thomas von Koch has extensive financial and leadership experience spanning over 30 years. Mr. von Koch is currently chairman of the board at Swedish medical device company Bactiguard, a company he co-founded, and of which remains principal owner. Following 12 years at Investor AB, where he worked with corporate finance and mergers and acquisitions, he joined the global investment giant EQT as one of its initial team members. Mr. von Koch was CEO and Managing Partner of EQT from 2014 to 2019 and remains Deputy Managing Partner in EQT Partners AB.
Mr. von Koch has a Master of Science in Business Administration from the Stockholm School of Economics and extensive board, partnering and merger and acquisition experience. He currently has a holding of 1,118,210 shares and furthermore also owns 50 per cent of the shares in a company which owns additionally 159,744 shares in SynAct. His aggregate direct and indirect holdings in SynAct hence amounts to 1,198,082 shares or approximately 3.77 per cent of the total number of shares in SynAct.
Jens Bager, Chairman of the Nomination Committee, said: “Thomas has an impressive career, and we are excited to welcome him to the SynAct Pharma board. His extensive leadership, finance experience and network of business and financial contacts will be invaluable as the company continues on its growth path and executes on its long-term plans.
The members of the Nomination Committee are Jens Bager (appointed by GL Capital AB, Chairman of the Nomination Committee), Niels Ankerstjerne Sloth (appointed by Bioinvest ApS), Per Colleen (appointed by TomEnterprise Public Capital AB), and Torbjørn Bjerke (Chairman of the Board).
Information about the proposed Board members, the Nomination Committee’s complete proposal and the Nomination Committee’s statement will be made available on SynAct Pharma’s website www.synactpharma.com, in connection with the publication of the notice of the Annual General Meeting.
The information was submitted, through the agency of the contact person below, for publication at 07:01 a.m CEST on April 3, 2023.