French drugmaker Sanofi has said goodbye to its Argentina CEO Sergio Navarro Hufenbach. In a calculated chess move, the Swiss Sebastien Delarive has already stepped into the position.
Sometimes company goodbyes come with little notice, but this week’s decision at Sanofi Argentina was completely unexpected.
As far as Pharmabiz could learn, the French multinational put an end to leadership of the Argentine Sergio Navarro Hufenbach after only one semester at the helm of the new Sanofi Genzyme.
The executive, whose background was in biotecnology, had led the local business to fifth place in terms of overall revenue. But this was not enough and the company has decided to lay him off, a move that came as a surprise to everyone.
On Tuesday, Navarro’s authorisation to enter the company was revoked and early in the morning the news was broken to him in the lobby of a hotel in a painstakingly calculated manoeuvre. The company has already presented Swiss Sebastien Delarive, who introduced himself to the local team in English with a strong French accent.
For now, there’s been no official explanation, but there appear to be two motives for the move: the bypassing of regional head Steven Cobhan when Navarro was chosen in December, and certain decisions taken by Navarro that may have broken compliance.
