Overview

Gender

male

Mr. Walbert has served as chairman of our board of directors since 2010 and our president and chief executive officer since June 2008. Mr. Walbert served as president, chief executive officer and director of IDM Pharma, Inc., a public biopharmaceutical company which was acquired by Takeda America Holdings, Inc., or Takeda, in June 2009.
Prior to IDM, Mr. Walbert served as executive vice president, commercial operations at NeoPharm, Inc., a public biopharmaceutical company. From 2001 to 2005, Mr. Walbert served as divisional vice president and general manager, immunology, where he led the global development and launch of the multi-indication biologic HUMIRA, which is on track to exceed $10.0 billion in 2013 sales, and divisional vice president, global cardiovascular strategy at Abbott, now AbbVie.
From 1998 to 2001, Mr. Walbert served as director, CELEBREX North America and arthritis team leader, Asia Pacific, Latin America and Canada at G.D. Searle & Company.
From 1991 to 1998, Mr. Walbert also held sales and marketing roles with increasing responsibility at G.D. Searle, Merck & Co., Inc. and Wyeth. Mr. Walbert received his B.A. in business from Muhlenberg College, in Allentown, Pennsylvania.
Mr. Walbert serves on the board of directors of XOMA Ltd. (NASDAQ: XOMA), Raptor Pharmaceutical Corp. (NASDAQ: RPTP), the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO), the Illinois Biotechnology Industry Organization (iBIO), ChicagoNEXT, a World Business Chicago (WBC) led council of technology leaders and the Greater Chicago Arthritis Foundation.
Mr. Walbert was also recently appointed by Illinois Governor Pat Quinn to the Illinois Innovation Council.