Galapagos Chief Exec Stoffels Leaving, While Firm Names Spinout’s CEO

Galapagos revealed its second leadership transition in as many weeks on 22 April, reporting that CEO Paul Stoffels plans to retire from the company upon the appointment of a new chief executive, who will be hired within the next 12 months. Also, Henry Gosebruch, who previously served as CEO of Neumora Therapeutics, has been named the founding CEO of the company Galapagos plans to spin out later this year.

Johnson & Johnson research and development veteran Stoffels’ retirement and Gosebruch’s appointment to helm the new company, referred to as XYZ SpinCo NV for now, follows the 15 April news that Galapagos chief financial officer and chief operating officer Thad Huston is leaving the company, effective 1 August, to return to the US for personal and professional reasons. The company will name Huston’s successor in the coming months. Galapagos expects the separation of the SpinCo, announced in January, to happen in mid-2025.

Huston joined Mechelen, Belgium-based Galapagos in 2023 from chimeric antigen receptor T-cell (CAR-T) therapy firm Kite Pharma, a subsidiary of Gilead Sciences, Galapagos’s longtime partner. Galapagos will retain €500m ($571.4m) in cash and full ownership of its cell therapy programs following the spinout, while Gilead’s approximately 25% ownership of the company will shift to the SpinCo, which will retain €2.45bn ($2.8bn) in cash to focus on acquiring and developing drugs in the areas of oncology, immunology and/or virology.

The SpinCo’s cash stockpile is what remains of the $5.05bn – $3.95bn in cash and $1.1bn in equity – that Gilead invested in Galapagos up front in 2019 when the companies agreed to partner on the development of drugs to treat inflammation and fibrosis. The partnership did not yield any clinical trial successes and Galapagos shifted its focus to point-of-care CAR-T therapies in 2023.

Former J&J CSO Oversaw Transition After Setbacks

Stoffels joined Galapagos in 2022 with much fanfare after the company suffered several late-stage setbacks, including discontinuation of development for Gilead-partnered ziritaxestat after the drug’s Phase III failure in idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis. Gilead also had decided to end its participation in development of the JAK inhibitor Jyseleca (filgotinib) after the US Food and Drug Administration rejected the drug in rheumatoid arthritis.

Stoffels’ J&J legacy included spearheading the creation of the big pharma’s global biotechnology start-up incubator network, known as JLabs, as well as overseeing several of the company’s infectious disease efforts, including past work in HIV and more recent efforts with J&J’s COVID-19 vaccine. He retired from the company in 2021.

The Galapagos CEO informed his current company’s board of directors that he will retire upon appointment of his successor, but Stoffels is expected to remain as non-executive chairman of the Galapagos board to provide strategic guidance. The position will keep him involved for years into his retirement, since the board of directors will propose a second four-year board term for Stoffels at the company’s annual general meeting in 2026.

Galapagos has two clinical-stage cell therapy programs in the clinic, including the CD19-targeting CAR-T therapy GLPG5101 in the Phase I/II ATALANTA-1 trial enrolling lymphoma patients. The BCMA-targeting CAR-T GLPG5301 has generated Phase I data in multiple myeloma, but the company is evaluating next steps for the asset. Ten additional cell therapy programs are in earlier stages of development for solid tumors and hematologic malignancies.

While the current Galapagos portfolio also includes TYK2 inhibitor GLPG3667, which is being evaluated in Phase II trials in systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and dermatomyositis (DM) with topline results expected in the first half of 2026, the company is seeking partners to take over its small molecule assets, including GLPG3667. The SpinCo will focus on acquiring external programs and developing those assets.

Gosebruch’s M&A Background Will Serve SpinCo

Galapagos cited Gosebruch’s experience with mergers and acquisitions, business development, partnering and venture capital, building growth-stage companies, prudently allocating capital and creating shareholder value when announcing his appointment as CEO of the SpinCo.

Gosebruch’s tenure at Neumora included the company’s $250m initial public offering in 2023 to fund a Phase III depression drug program. However, Neumora’s stock price sank in early January when the company’s kappa opioid receptor antagonist navacaprant failed in the first of three Phase III trials in major depressive disorder in January. Neumora announced in February that Gosebruch was leaving the company.

Before Neumora, Gosebruch was executive vice president and chief strategy officer at AbbVie, where his responsibilities included search and evaluation, business development, acquisitions, alliance management, R&D decision support and corporate strategy. His AbbVie team completed more than 100 transactions, including the $63bn acquisition of Allergan that closed in 2020 and the 2016 partnership with Boehringer Ingelheim that led to now-blockbuster inflammatory disease drug Skyrizi (risankizumab).

Gosebruch negotiated M&A deals on behalf of clients at J.P. Morgan for 20 years before joining AbbVie in 2015.