ULORIC - Key Persons

Akiko Amakawa - CEO

Job Titles:

CEO
Chief of Staff
Corporate Strategy Officer
Corporate Strategy Officer & CEO Chief of Staff

Akiko Amakawa is the corporate strategy officer & CEO chief of staff, where she oversees the Board of Directors & CEO Office, Corporate Strategy, and Corporate Governance Management for Takeda. Since joining Takeda's Corporate Business Development group in 2018, and most recently serving as the Global Business Development Head of Gastrointestinal & Inflammation, Neuroscience and Vaccines Corporate Development, she has led several strategic business development initiatives, including the acquisition of Nimbus Therapeutics' TYK2 program (TAK-279), and partnering with Moderna, Novavax and the Government of Japan to supply critical Covid-19 vaccines to Japan during the height of the pandemic. Akiko has more than 20 years of corporate development, business development, and corporate strategy experience across different countries and industries, primarily in the Pharmaceutical, Life Sciences, Technology and Automotive sectors in Japan, the U.S. and China. Prior to joining Takeda, she worked for Corning Incorporated, Bristol-Myers Squibb, and Mitsubishi Corporation. Akiko holds a bachelor's degree in economics from University of Tokyo and a master's degree in business administration from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Andrew S. Plump

Job Titles:

Director - President, Research & Development

Andrew Plump, M.D., Ph.D., is the president of Research & Development (R&D) at Takeda and serves as a member of the company's Board of Directors. Dr. Plump joined Takeda to oversee the company's global R&D organization in 2015. Early in his Takeda tenure he orchestrated a multi-year strategic and cultural transformation that resulted in a renewed focus on innovation, streamlined global footprint, prioritized therapeutic areas of focus, a rich network of partnerships and a modality-diverse portfolio of newly approved and promising late-stage development experimental therapies. He also championed efforts to establish an exciting and sustainable early development and research pipeline, founded on strong translational science. Over the last several years of Dr. Plump's leadership, Takeda has embraced scientific advances and the emergence of data and digital technology to build a renewed, diverse and highly innovative pipeline of investigational medicines that are expected to provide meaningful benefits to patients. Prior to Takeda, Dr. Plump served as senior vice president, Research & Translational Medicine, deputy to the president of R&D at Sanofi, based in Paris, France. Before Sanofi, he served as vice president, Worldwide Cardiovascular Research head at Merck, where he had direct responsibility for cardiovascular research, preclinical development and translational sciences. Dr. Plump received his M.D. from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), his Ph.D. in cardiovascular genetics with Dr. Jan Breslow at Rockefeller University and his B.S. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He completed a residency in Internal Medicine and a fellowship in Medical Genetics at UCSF. Following his clinical training, Dr. Plump trained as a Howard Hughes and Stanley J. Sarnoff postdoctoral fellow with Dr. Marc Tessier-Lavigne at UCSF, concurrently assuming faculty responsibilities as an adjunct clinical instructor in the Department of Medical Genetics. Dr. Plump lives in Boston with his wife Suzanne and has three children.

Christophe Weber - CEO, President

Job Titles:

Chief Executive Officer
President
Representative Director
Member of the US Business Council
Representative Director - President & CEO

Christophe Weber is president, chief executive officer (CEO) and representative director of Takeda. He joined the company in April 2014 as chief operating officer, was named president and representative director in June 2014, and was subsequently appointed CEO in April 2015. Christophe has focused on ensuring the company's competitiveness through globalization and R&D transformation - all while creating a diverse and inclusive working environment and strengthening Takeda's ethical values and corporate governance. Through this transformation, Takeda has become one of the leading global biopharmaceutical companies. Prior to joining Takeda, Christophe spent 20 years at GlaxoSmithKline where he held senior leadership roles in Europe, Asia and the United States. Christophe is a member of The US Business Council, the World Economic Forum's International Business Council, the New York Stock Exchange's NYSE Board Advisory Council, the Massachusetts Competitive Partnership's Board of Directors, the MIT CEO Advisory Board and Singapore's Human Health & Potential International Advisory Committee. He also serves on the Board of Trustees of Northeastern University. Christophe holds a doctorate in pharmacy and pharmacokinetics, master's degrees in pharmaceutical marketing and accounting and finance, and a degree in statistics from the University of Lyon, France. Christophe lives in Tokyo and Boston with his wife and has two children.

Costa Saroukos - CFO

Job Titles:

Chief Financial Officer
Director - Chief Financial Officer

Costa Saroukos is the chief financial officer (CFO) of Takeda. He joined the company in May 2015 as CFO of the Europe and Canada Business Unit and was appointed CFO in March 2018. Mr. Saroukos is also a member of the Takeda Executive Team reporting to the company's president & CEO. Prior to joining Takeda, Costa was head of finance and business development at Allergan for the Asia-Pacific region, including China and Japan. He was also the finance director for Greater China and Japan. He also spent 13 years at Merck & Co. as the executive finance director for EEMEA (Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa), finance director of South Korea, and head of internal audit Asia Pacific and Global Joint Ventures. Costa holds a Bachelor of Commerce majoring in accounting and is a member of the Australian Society of Certified Practicing Accounts. Costa is based in Tokyo.

Elaine Shannon

Job Titles:

Global Quality Officer

Emiko Higashi

Job Titles:

External Director - Audit & Supervisory Committee Member

Gabriele Ricci

Job Titles:

Chief Data and Technology Officer
Head of Plasma - Derived Therapies IT

Gabriele Ricci is the chief data and technology officer of Takeda. He was appointed to this role in February 2022 and leads the transformation of Takeda's Data, Digital and Technology division. Gabriele joined Takeda in 2019 as head of Plasma-Derived Therapies IT, during which he drove initiatives to meet the large and growing demand for plasma-derived products, with highly specialized services that require strategic capacity, innovative business models, dedicated R&D and agile supply allocation on a global scale. Prior to joining Takeda, Gabriele served as head of Digital Health and Emerging Technology at Shire, where he leveraged new and emerging technologies to optimize internal operations and deliver differentiated patient and customer experiences. Gabriele has also served as Shire's head of Technical Operations IT and held leadership positions at Novartis, Johnson & Johnson and Bristol-Myers Squibb. Gabriele brings more than 18 years of information technology and engineering expertise in the life sciences industry and sits on several advisory boards for non-profit organizations focused on digital, life sciences and manufacturing. Gabriele holds an MBA from the MIB Trieste School of Management and a bachelor's degree in engineering from the University of Rome Tor Vergata.

Giles Platford

Job Titles:

Global Chair of the Board for the Plasma Protein Therapeutics Association
in 2009 As General Manager of Brazil
President of the Plasma - Derived Therapies Business Unit
President, Plasma - Derived Therapies Business Unit

Giles Platford is president of the Plasma-Derived Therapies Business Unit, which researches and delivers critical life-transforming medicines used to treat a variety of rare and complex chronic diseases. Giles also serves as the current global chair of the board for the Plasma Protein Therapeutics Association, which represents the private sector manufacturers of plasma protein therapies. Giles joined Takeda in 2009 as general manager of Brazil, and later took on the role of area head for Middle East, Turkey & Africa. He then joined the Takeda Executive Team in 2014 as president of Emerging Markets. In 2017, he became president of Europe & Canada, where he also represented Takeda as a board member of the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations. Prior to joining Takeda, Giles spent eight years in Asia Pacific, where he held a number of roles of increasing responsibility in Business Development, Commercial and General Management. Giles holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in business and marketing management from Oxford Brookes University, UK, and is currently based in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Ian Clark

Job Titles:

External Director

Jean-Luc Butel

Job Titles:

External Director

Jan 1998 - Corporate Officer, President, Worldwide Consumer Healthcare, Becton, Dickinson and Company Nov 1999 - President, Independence Technology, Johnson & Johnson May 2008 - Corporate Officer, Executive Committee Member, Executive Vice President and Group President, International, Medtronic, Inc. Jan 2015 - President, International, Baxter International Inc. Jul 2015 - Global Healthcare Advisor, President, K8 Global Pte. Ltd. (to present) Jun 2016 - External Director of the Company who is an ASC Member Sep 2017 - External Director, Novo Holdings A/S (to present) Jun 2019 - External Director of the Company (to present) Sep 2021 - External Director, Rani Therapeutics (to present)

John Maraganore

Job Titles:

External Director

Julie Kim

Job Titles:

President of the U.S. Business Unit
President, U.S. Business Unit, and U.S. Country Head

Julie Kim is president of the U.S. Business Unit, U.S. country head and member of Takeda's Executive Team. The U.S. Business Unit portfolio encompasses gastroenterology, neuroscience, plasma-derived therapies and rare diseases. She joined Takeda in 2019 through the acquisition of Shire, where she held several diverse roles with increasing responsibility. As part of Takeda, she became the president of the Plasma-Derived Therapies Business Unit, the position she occupied until April of 2022, when she became president of the U.S. Business Unit and U.S. country head. Julie has 30 years of experience in health care, with leadership positions at global, regional, country and functional levels. In the biopharmaceutical industry, her experiences have spanned a variety of therapeutic areas, international market access, country and regional general management, marketing and emerging market development. Julie is known for strong, collaborative and inclusive leadership that enables Takeda to meet the needs of the people the company serves while driving innovations that will improve patients' lives. Her global outlook, a result of having worked in many countries in Europe, Asia and Latin America, as well as having lived in the U.K., Switzerland and the U.S., has helped her create teams that are diverse in multiple dimensions to enable inclusive decision-making that keeps the patient at the center. She earned an MBA from the J. L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University and a bachelor's degree in economics from Dartmouth College. She resides with her family in the Boston area.