Amrad MD resigns

Sandra Webb has resigned as managing director of Amrad to pursue other interests.

The resignation is effective immediately, and board member Bob Moses will assume a caretaker role for the company.

Amrad chairman Olaf O'Duill said that Webb had been instrumental in delivering some important deals to Amrad, including the recent US$112 million deal with Merck. Webb also oversaw the divestment of Amrad's Richmond property last month.

But O'Duill also said that the board of directors would be looking for a managing director who would be able to focus on increasing the market value of the company.

"We'll be looking for someone with scientific knowledge, but also someone with a more aggressive commercial approach than we've had up to now," he said.

O'Duill noted that companies needed to consistently sell themselves to investors and analysts, and that this had not been happening at Amrad.

He estimated that the search for a new managing director would take at least three to six months.

"The person will have to be pretty special, I think," he said.

Biotechnology analyst David Blake, of Bioshares, said that Webb's resignation came as no surprise, following the recent review of the company and its reorientation to early-stage projects, rather than clinical studies.

And he said that the timing of last year's capital raising and the structuring of the property deal may have raised questions with some of Amrad's major investors.

"Webb's resignation will pave the way for Amrad to reinvent itself as a well-funded, mature drug discovery and development company with progressively less and less baggage from a, to say the least, unhappy and disappointing performance," Blake said.