Sophiris Bio (San Diego) has named Randall E. Woods (right) CEO. Woods brings almost 40 years of industry experience to Sophiris, including past roles as CEO at Sequel Pharmaceuticals, NovaCardia and Corvas International, and president of Boehringer Mannheim's US pharmaceutical operations. He currently serves on the board of Arena Pharmaceuticals and is chairman of the board for Sorbent Therapeutics.

“Randy's blend of executive experience in biotech research and development, pharmaceutical sales and marketing, coupled with successful fundraising and value creation makes him an ideal fit for leading Sophiris into the next phase of growth, beginning with advancing PRX302 into pivotal trials later this year,” says Lars Ekman, executive chairman and president of Sophiris.

Pharmacyclics (Sunnyvale, CA, USA) has announced the appointment of Joshua T. Brumm as executive vice president of finance. He was most recently CFO and senior vice president for ZELTIQ Aesthetics. Before joining ZELTIQ, Brumm served as director of finance at Proteolix.

Dirk J. Evers has been named senior vice president, informatics and Kevin V. Shianna senior vice president, sequencing operations at New York Genome Center (New York). Evers joins NYGC from Illumina, where he led the company's computational biology efforts in the UK. Shianna was most recently an assistant professor at the School of Medicine, director of operations for the Center for Human Genome Variation and founding director for the Genomic Analysis Facility at Duke University.

DARA BioSciences (Raleigh, NC, USA) has appointed Timothy J. Heady to its board of directors. Heady retired in 2011 as CEO of UnitedHealthcare Pharmacy. Prior to joining UnitedHealthcare in 2001, he was a senior executive with Searle/Pharmacia where he managed the customer operations unit.

Neuren Pharmaceuticals (Sydney) has announced that Joseph Horrigan has joined the company as vice president of clinical development and medical affairs. Horrigan most recently served as assistant vice president and head of medical research at Autism Speaks, the autism science and advocacy organization. Previously, he coordinated pediatric drug development in the neurosciences medicines development center at GlaxoSmithKline.

Nile Therapeutics (San Mateo, CA, USA) has promoted Darlene Horton to president and CEO, and appointed her as a director of the company. She previously served as Nile's chief medical officer after joining the company from Itero Biopharmaceuticals.

Christine Larson has been named vice president and CFO, a newly created position, at Dynavax Technologies (Berkeley, CA, USA). She brings nearly 25 years of experience as a financial professional, most recently leading financial and strategic planning, accounting, and treasury and investor relations for PDL Biopharma.

Ivana Magovcevic-Liebisch has been appointed to the newly created position of executive vice president, COO of Dyax (Burlington, MA, USA). She joined the company in 2001 and has previously served as vice president of intellectual property, executive vice president and general counsel, and most recently executive vice president and chief business officer. Dyax also announced the promotion of Burt Adelman, chief medical officer, to executive vice president.

Endocyte (West Lafayette, IN, USA) has named David Meek to the newly created position of chief commercial officer. Meek brings more than 20 years of pharmaceutical industry experience, coming to Endocyte from Novartis Pharma where he was most recently the head of northern and central Europe oncology.

Cardio3 BioSciences (Mont-Saint-Guibert, Belgium) has announced the appointment of Alexander Milstein as vice president of clinical development. Previously, Milstein held the position of vice president, clinical development at Cytori Therapeutics.

Epistem (Manchester, UK) co-founder Chris Potten passed away on August 6 at the age of 71. One of the world's most influential figures in epithelial biology, Potten pioneered adult stem cell research in this area beginning in the early 1970s, leading a research team at the Paterson Institute For Cancer Research at the Christie Hospital, Manchester, until retiring in 2000. He was recognized for his work with a Life Fellowship from the Cancer Research Campaign (now Cancer Research UK), in addition to the International Marie Curie and Weiss medals for services to radiation research. He is survived by his second wife, Carol, and three sons.

Seth M. Shaw has been appointed CEO and chairman of the board of directors of Immunovative (Montreal, Quebec, Canada), replacing Antonio Treminio. Shaw is the founder of Novastar Resources and served as the founding CFO of Physician Therapeutics in 2004.

ImmunoCellular Therapeutics (Woodland Hills, CA, USA) president and CEO Manish Singh has resigned, with company founder, CSO and chairman John S. Yu taking on the roles on an interim basis until a permanent successor is selected. Singh was appointed president and CEO in February 2008.

ADVENTRX Pharmaceuticals (San Diego) has named Santosh J. Vetticaden chief medical officer and senior vice president. Vetticaden has more than 25 years of experience in drug development and medicine, most recently as senior vice president and chief medical and development officer at Cubist Pharmaceuticals. Before joining Cubist, he served in the same capability at Maxygen.

Coronado Biosciences (Burlington, MA, USA) has announced the election of Harlan F. Weisman to its board of directors. Weisman brings over 20 years of experience as a senior healthcare executive. He was previously chief science and technology officer for the Johnson & Johnson (J&J) medical devices and diagnostics group as well as former chairman, pharmaceutical R&D at J&J.