Sunao Manabe
Profile
Performance in office
Tenure
Tenure
Background
He joined Sankyo in 1978 and became head of its Drug Safety Research Laboratories in July 2005. After the merger he continued as head of Daiichi Sankyo's Drug Safety Research Laboratories in April 2007, then became Executive Officer in April 2009, Managing Executive Officer in April 2014, Director and Senior Executive Officer in April 2015, and Representative Director and Executive Vice President in June 2016. Coming from Sankyo, one of the two predecessor companies, he rose to the presidency from the research side that evaluates the safety of drug candidates.
Selection
In April 2017 Joji Nakayama stepped back to Chairman and CEO, and Sunao Manabe became President and COO. Nakayama remained CEO; Manabe took on the CEO title only in June 2019. In the fiscal year before he took office, ended March 2017, consolidated revenue was ¥955.1 billion and operating income ¥88.9 billion. The mid-term management plan set the year before targeted operating income of ¥165.0 billion for FY ended March 2021 and a shift from cardiovascular drugs to oncology, and the company was racing to develop the cancer drug candidate DS-8201.
Initiatives
In March 2019 the company signed an alliance with AstraZeneca to jointly develop and commercialize the cancer drug Enhertu worldwide except Japan. Enhertu launched in the U.S. in January 2020, and in July that year the company signed a deal worth up to about ¥630 billion with the same partner for DS-1062, the two deals together being valued at over ¥1 trillion. By July 2022 its market capitalization reached about ¥6.9 trillion, overtaking Takeda Pharmaceutical and Astellas Pharma to become Japan's largest drugmaker. That same month a U.S. federal district court in Texas found infringement of Seattle Genetics' patent and ordered the company to pay about ¥5.7 billion.
Career
Career
Sankyo Company, Limited
| Date | Position |
|---|---|
| Apr 1978 | Joined |
| Jul 2005 | Director, Safety Laboratory |
Daiichi Sankyo
| Date | Position |
|---|---|
| Apr 2007 | Director, Safety Laboratory |
| Apr 2009 | Executive Officer |
| Apr 2014 | Managing Executive Officer |
| Jun 2014 | Director, Managing Executive Officer |
| Apr 2015 | Director, Senior Managing Executive Officer |
| Jun 2016 | Representative Director, Executive Vice President, Executive Officer |
| Apr 2017 | Representative Director, President and COO |
| Jun 2019 | Representative Director, President and CEO |
| Apr 2023 | Representative Director, Chairman and CEO |
| Apr 2023 | Stepped down as President |
| Apr 2025 | Representative Director, Chairman |