Sobi promotes Lydia Abad-Franch to head R&D and as CMO

Rare diseases specialist Swedish Orphan Biovitrum (STO: SOBI; also known as Sobi) today announced that Lydia Abad-Franch has been appointed as senior vice president, head of research, development and medical affairs (RDMA), and chief medical office, a role which she has held on an interim basis since June.

“Lydia is both an accomplished leader in rare diseases and an esteemed practicing medical doctor,” said Guido Oelkers, chief executive of Sobi. “In addition, she has deep knowledge of the Sobi business as she has been with us for almost four years. This makes her the ideal RDMA leader for us as we continue building our pipeline to bring new medicines to patients, expand our existing products into new indications and regions where they address unmet medical needs, and gather real-world evidence for available products,” he noted.

Dr Abad-Franch brings extensive experience and knowledge from the global pharmaceutical industry as well as from being a practicing medical doctor and clinical investigator. Prior to joining Sobi in 2020, she led medical affairs teams for Baxter-Baxalta-Shire-Takeda (TYO: 4502), successfully introducing new innovative rare disease treatments after starting in the pharma industry as medical lead for Novo Nordisk (NOV: N). She will continue to report to CEO Guido Oelkers and be a member of the Sobi executive committee.