By Rocky Swift
TOKYO (Reuters) -Takeda Pharmaceutical said on Thursday its CEO Christophe Weber will retire after more than a decade at the helm of Japan’s biggest drugmaker as the company upped its full-year profit outlook.
Julie Kim, president of the company’s U.S. unit, was named to succeed Weber in June 2026.
Weber, one of the highest-profile foreign CEOs in Japan, spearheaded Takeda’s $59 billion takeover of British-founded Shire Plc. While the deal expanded Takeda’s drug pipeline and global reach, the company’s shares have languished since it was announced.
Takeda’s shares closed up 0.65% on Thursday before the results and CEO change were announced.
Takeda raised its full-year profit forecast after quarterly results that trailed analyst estimates.
The company expects operating profit to reach 344 billion yen from earlier guidance of 265 billion yen, citing strong product performance, operating efficiencies, and revised currency assumptions.
Operating profit in the three months through end-December stood at 66.9 billion yen ($432.56 million), the company said, versus 104.9 billion yen a year earlier and a consensus profit estimate of 78.1 billion yen in an LSEG survey of six analysts.
French national Weber was the first foreign chief executive at Takeda, whose history goes back more than 200 years. He joined the company in April 2014 as chief operating officer and was named CEO the following year.
The Shire purchase was criticised by some analysts who felt the acquisition price was too high and the deal was met with opposition from some Takeda shareholders and founding family members.
MIXED LEGACY
Since Takeda clinched the deal in May 2018, its shares have fallen about 10% while the benchmark Nikkei index is up more than 170% since then.
“His legacy is the Shire acquisition which was not full of shining assets, unfortunately,” said UBS healthcare analyst Fumiyoshi Sakai. “Under the Julie Kim regime, I wonder if Takeda will put more weight on its operations in Boston, USA.”
Kim, who will be the first woman to head Takeda, joined the company in 2019 along with the acquisition of Shire. She was the head of Takeda’s plasma-derived therapies unit before becoming president for the U.S. region in April 2022.
Takeda said in May it would re-organise to improve profitability and refocus on drug research and development.
Takeda has cut jobs or transferred staff at centres in the United States and in October announced an early retirement plan for some employees in Japan.
The company is trying to rebuild its drug pipeline after losing patent protection on major earners and to recover from clinical trial failures of treatments for lung cancer and Crohn’s disease that caused hefty impairment losses.
It has high hopes for its experimental narcolepsy treatment TAK-861 and a psoriasis drug candidate bought from U.S.-based Nimbus Therapeutics in late 2022 for as much as $6 billion.
Takeda gets more than half its revenue from the United States, which stands to be impacted by new import tariffs on pharmaceuticals pledged by U.S. President Donald Trump.
The company on Tuesday declined to comment on the ratio of its drug production in the U.S. or the potential effect of such tariffs.
Along with interim results, Takeda announced it would discontinue its soticlestat (TAK-935) programme after a failed Phase 3 in Lennox-Gastaut syndrome (LGS).
The company also announced it would buy back up to 1.8% of shares worth 100 billion yen.
($1 = 154.6600 yen)
(Reporting by Rocky Swift and Kentaro Okasaka; Editing by Saad Sayeed and Jane Merriman)
