AstraZeneca Ireland country president Alex Wilkes. Image: Jason Clarke
AstraZeneca, which partnered with Oxford University on a Covid-19 vaccine, is headquartered in the UK and has substantial operations in Ireland.
Global pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca has appointed Alex Wilkes as its country president for Ireland.
Wilkes has been working with AstraZeneca since 2019. Most recently, he served as regional commercial director for respiratory and immunology within the company’s EUCAN market team, which encompasses the Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, France, Spain, Ireland, Belgium and the UK.
Prior to joining AstraZeneca, Alex spent more than 18 years in various senior leadership roles in the pharmaceutical industry across the UK and Switzerland, including at Hoffmann-La Roche, Eli Lilly and Merck.
“I am proud to join the AstraZeneca Ireland team at such an exciting time of growth and innovation. At AstraZeneca we are passionate about pushing the boundaries of science to deliver life-changing medicines to patients,” Wilkes said upon his appointment.
“I look forward to collaborating with colleagues and all stakeholders to continue our journey to transform the future of healthcare by unlocking the power of what science can do for people, society and the planet.”
Wilkes has an undergraduate degree in anatomy and physiology from the University of Leeds and an MBA from Manchester Business School.
AstraZeneca, the British-Swedish pharma giant that partnered with the University of Oxford to create one of the major Covid-19 vaccines, is headquartered in the UK and has substantial operations in Ireland.
Last year, AstraZeneca announced plans to invest €65m to expand its Irish manufacturing and R&D operations. This followed an announcement in 2021 that the multinational biopharma firm was making a major investment in a new manufacturing facility in Dublin.
Earlier this year, AstraZeneca agreed to acquire US biotech CinCor Pharma in a deal worth up to $1.8bn, in order to expand its pipeline of heart and kidney drugs.
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