General Counsel for Swiss Pharma Giant Roche Is Stepping Down
Gottlieb Keller will retire in March after serving as GC for more than a decade. His successor, Claudia Böckstiegel, is being promoted from her post as legal head of Roche's diagnostics division.
December 10, 2019 at 01:34 PM
3 minute read
Claudia Böckstiegel. (Courtesy photo)
The longtime general counsel of F. Hoffmann-La Roche is preparing to hand over the reins of the Swiss global health care company's legal department.
Claudia Böckstiegel will step up from her post as legal head of Roche's diagnostics division and take over as general counsel when Gottlieb Keller retires on March 31. Keller, 65, arrived at Roche in 1984 as a corporate counsel and steadily climbed the company's ranks until he reached the top lawyer position in 2008.
Last year, Keller received $1.5 million in base salary along with $1.4 million in bonus pay and more than $1 million in stock appreciation rights, according to Roche's annual financial report.
As GC, Keller had a hand in several high-profile cases, including the New Jersey Supreme Court's decision in 2018 to update its standard on the admissibility of expert evidence in products litigation.
The ruling upheld the exclusion of plaintiff expert testimony that linked Roche's anti-acne drug Accutane to the development of Crohn's disease. At the time, Keller hailed the decision as a "victory for patient health and for good science."
Keller also oversaw Roche's legal department as the firm was navigating some big M&A deals, including a $46.8 billion acquisition of Genetech Inc. in 2009, the $8.7 billion acquisition of InterMune in 2014, and a $5.7 billion hostile takeover bid for Illumina Inc. in 2012, which was unsuccessful.
His successor, Böckstiegel, 55, joined Roche in 2001 as legal counsel for Roche Diagnostics in Mannheim, Germany. She relocated to the company's headquarters in Basel, Switzerland in 2016, after being named head of legal diagnostics.
She is a graduate of the Georgetown University Law Center and Universities of Mannheim and Heidelberg in Germany.
Böckstiegel and Keller were unavailable for interviews.
In announcing the leadership change on Monday, Roche CEO Severin Schwan described Keller as "an outstanding lawyer and at the same time a strong leader with a comprehensive understanding of our industry. I wish him all the best for the future.
"I am delighted that Claudia Böckstiegel, a very competent and experienced successor from our own ranks, will take on the role of general counsel," he added.
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