Nanogen last week announced that David Ludvigson, its executive vice president and chief financial officer, has replaced Bruce Huebner as president and chief operating officer. Ludvigson will report to Howard Birndorf, founder, chief executive officer, and chairman of the company, which is developing an electronic microarray platform for diagnostic applications.
Huebner stepped down to pursue other interests, but will stay at the San Diego-based company for several months in a transition capacity, the company said in a statement.
Huebner joined Nanogen in December 2002, after serving as a consultant to the company for the three months prior to that. He came to Nanogen from a position as executive vice president and chief operating officer of Gen-Probe, where he had worked for 10 years.
Ludvigson initially served on the Nanogen board of directors starting in 1996 and took the position of executive vice president in May 2003. Before that, he was CEO of Black Pearl, a software development firm. Previous to that, he was president of InterTrust Technologies, another software firm. He has pharmaceutical experience from two years (1998-2000) as CFO and COO of Matrix Pharmaceuticals, and another three years (1993-1996) as vice president and CFO of IDEC. He holds a bachelor’s and a master’s from the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign.
Turnover at the top has made Nanogen resemble a carousel ride at a carnival.
Huebner replaced Kieran Gallahue as president in November 2002. Gallahue was appointed on Sept. 6, 2000, taking a position previously held by Birndorf, who took that title when Tina Nova retired in January 2000. Concurrent with Gallahue’s departure in 2002, Randy White, chief executive officer and board member, resigned for health reasons and was replaced by Birndorf.
Graham Lidgard, senior vice president for research and development, is now the senior manager in Nanogen’s executive suite. He joined the company in January 2003. Larry Respess, the company’s senior vice president, general counsel, and secretary, joined the firm in May, while David Boudreau, vice president of operations, joined the company in April.
—MOK