Glenmark Pharmaceuticals SA (Switzerland) (GPSA), a wholly owned subsidiary of Glenmark Pharmaceuticals Ltd has appointed Dr. Michael Buschle as President - Biologics.

Dr. Buschle has over 12 years of pharmaceutical / biotech industry experience in areas including drug research and development and biopharmaceuticals manufacturing. He was one of the co-founders of Intercell AG and was previously associated with Boehringer Ingelheim as well as leading academic institution in the United Kingdom, USA and Austria. He will be responsible for leading the Glenmark group's initiative in the area of biopharmaceutical research, manufacturing and marketing, informed a company release.

Glenn Saldanha, Managing Director and CEO of the Company, remarked, "We are pleased to welcome Dr. Buschle to the Glenmark team. His appointment herald our entry into the fast-growing and high potential area of biopharmaceutical research and perfectly complements our ongoing efforts in NCE research at Our research laboratories in Switzerland and India.

The state-of-the-art research centre in Switzerland will help GPSA expand its portfolio of targets and drug candidates that will be taken up for clinical development. The company expects to hire 15-20 additional scientists to focus on biopharmaceutical research in the canton of Neuchatel. It would also collaborate with Swiss universities and leading R&D institutions in Europe, added the release.

GPSA had set-up is offices in Switzerland in 2004 and has been engaged in clinical and non-clinical development of the group's NCE programmes. Currently, the company has two compounds in clinical trials; Oglemilast, a PDE-4 inhibitor for Asthma & COPD, an GRC 8200, a DPP-4 inhibitor for Diabetes, GPSA also recently announced another drug candidate, a CB-1 antagonist for Obesity, which is in late pre-clinical studies and is expected to enter Phase I trials by May 2006.