Drug companies hire Korean local heads

Multinational pharmaceutical firms traditionally have conservative management, but more and more Koreans are being appointed as heads of local branches because they can speak English.
In the past year, three of four new heads at local offices of multinational drug companies were Korean. More than 60 percent of all multinational firms hire Koreans to head their branches here, but pharmaceutical firms had been slow to join that trend.
Most recently, Hong Yu-seok, 42, became president of Eli Lilly Korea, the first Korean in that position. Eli Lilly, which established a local presence in 1982, is famed for its anti-depressant drug Prozac and erectile disfunction treatment Cialis.
Explaining his appointment, Mr. Hong said that Americans are increasingly acknowledging Koreans’ business skill. “Now there are many global talents with international intuition, and headquarters has begun to note that Koreans’ English skills have been upgraded on the whole,” he said. Mr. Hong joined Eli Lilly in 1992 in the United States and worked in the Korean office for seven years.
Other newly appointed Korean heads of local pharmaceutical branches include Park Sun-dong of Bristol-Myers Squibb Korea (BMS), and Choi Tae-hong of Janssen Korea, maker of Tylenol. The president of GlaxoSmithKline Korea, Kim Jin-ho, is also Korean.
Behind the rise, analysts say, is the hard work of the first-generation Korean presidents, who are now heads of foreign offices. For instance, Lee Hee-yeol, president of Bayer Health Care China, was in charge of BMS Korea in the late 1990s during the Asian financial crisis. He was acknowledged for his management skills and for growth rates of 50 percent annually, and was made head of BMS Oceana before moving in 2005 to Bayer. Park Je-hwa, head of Janssen Taiwan-Hong Kong, was the president of Janssen Korea in 1993, where he tripled sales.
“Korean employees at Janssen Korea were able to build foreign experience a decade ago. Koreans’ global business ability is beginning to surface now,” said Park Je-hwa. Koreans are also becoming senior executives of regional offices. Recently, Yang Yoon-hee, a public relations officer at GSK Korea, was transferred to the Asia-Pacific office, and Koh Jae-wook, head of Novartis Korea’s clinical medicine department, was moved to Novartis Asia-Pacific. Last May, Ryu Eun-ju, a marketing official at Pfizer Korea, was promoted to brand manager at New York headquarters.

By Shim Jae-woo JoongAng Ilbo [wohn@joongang.co.kr]