Novartis Could Pay Vasella $78 Million in Severance

[Anonymous]

ZURICH—Novartis AG NOVN.VX +1.11% Chairman Daniel Vasella will receive a severance package that could total 72 million Swiss francs ($78 million) when he leaves the pharmaceutical giant, a payment likely to encourage supporters of a say-on-pay proposal slated to go before Swiss voters next month.

In an emailed statement, Dr. Vasella said the Basel-based company's board had agreed to a six-year severance package that has a maximum value of 72 million francs. The payment is contingent on Dr. Vasella respecting a noncompete agreement that prevents him from working for Novartis rivals.

"It has been very important to Novartis that I refrain from making my knowledge and know-how available to competitors and to take advantage of my experience with the company," Dr. Vasella said in the statement. "In return, the Novartis Board of Directors agreed to make annual payments according to fair market value provided I fulfill all my obligations."

He said he would donate the proceeds to philanthropic and charitable organizations.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324616604578307801551882078.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

But this doesn't sound like a guy who left on his own terms and would be unlikely to spoil something that he is so proud to have created.

The Swiss are so found of what he has done that they are seriously considering that no Swiss can better him and do it again.

"The payments to Dr. Vasella will likely fuel debate on a March 3 national referendum that would give shareholders of Swiss companies wide-ranging power over executive compensation if passed. The proposal would give shareholders veto authority over executive compensation plans and enshrine that power in the country's Constitution."

As they say "auf wiedersehen" "and don't let the door hit you in the ass as you are leavin' "

 

[Anonymous]

HUSH MONEY - Plain & simple

 

[Anonymous]

don't worry everyone should get a 1-2 % pay increase. Somebody has to bite the bullet and it will be the reps

 

[Anonymous]

This why we dont have a pension and lay people off during a time of record profit.

 

[Anonymous]

This is a company that does not pay for sales reps cell phones in the GM division.

 

[Anonymous]

This why we dont have a pension and lay people off during a time of record profit.

it's because they no longer needs sales people to sell and make a profit.

 

[Anonymous]

every company needs a sales team. If Novartis got rid of gen meds do you think anyone would write Patch or Exforge. Also their MS sales team will now face competition for the first time novartis will need a sales team to keep thinks going.

It is just Novartis does not value their sales teams because the current management really does not know what is done in the field. At one point there were to many reps but now it is down to bare bones.

 

[Anonymous]

every company needs a sales team. If Novartis got rid of gen meds do you think anyone would write Patch or Exforge. Also their MS sales team will now face competition for the first time novartis will need a sales team to keep thinks going.

It is just Novartis does not value their sales teams because the current management really does not know what is done in the field. At one point there were to many reps but now it is down to bare bones.

One issue with sales is NVS adjusts the sales numbers if sales is achieving more than 100%. It is happening in December T1 numbers. I see no motivation to work if my efforts are going to be adjusted down.

 

[GO HANS !!]

Not Happy

Hans-Jacob Heitz, a Swiss lawyer who acts for shareholders, may bring a criminal complaint against Vasella, according to Swiss television.

 

[Anonymous]

This fucker has pulled off the perfect corporate crime and the biggest at the same time. He was nothing. All he has going for him is his bipolar disease. It makes him crazy and super smart at the same tiem. The "smart" part is not smart in terms of say Bill Gates but in terms of Medoff and other devients who manipulated and defrauded others to get rich and even famous as this "celebrtiry" CEO thinks he has become.
All he did was married the niece of then Sandoz chairman of the board (apparently no one would she was ugly) and got on medication that brought out his deviant side. You know the rest of the story during his nazi regime lasting 17 years.
Now they are paying him for 7 years just as if he worked while no other employee ever got more than 2 years severance pay. Why is that? Not because he knows so much of biz that others would hire him and pay him big money. Are you kidding. No other bigpharmafia co would hire him for he has never been any factor in Novartis's "success" if you can call the crimnal behaviour of the company in all and every country they operate. Only in USA they got exposed to some extent but continue with the same shit criminal with impunity. That is the legacy of Vasella. His introduction of big time use of crime to enrich the company, impoverish the taxpayers and even kill some patients who were Rxed the right/approved medications for wrong indications.
This fucker knows so much about the criminality of Novartis that for that reason and that reason ONLY he is paid this hush money for so long. By the time it is over things will have been forgotten and he if still around will keep his fucking mouth shut (OMERTA for ever for a price) for ever.
Also by that time all the current criminlas who approved and participated in this crime will be out with ther own hush money for another 7 years. So you can imagine that no one will be able to prove anything in 14 years or care at all.
The only bright thing is that good Swiss people will vote to stop the crooks on Mar.3. That may be the begining of the trend spreading around the world to stop these criminals who have usurpted the economies and democracies in all the countries.
Those of you who think that globalization was such a good think, Vasellas of the world are direct result of it as are Novartis' of the world using any means to enrich themselves.
Mar. 3 may be the day the begingin of the end of globalization will happen. I hope so. How about you?

 

[Anonymous]

every company needs a sales team. If Novartis got rid of gen meds do you think anyone would write Patch or Exforge. Also their MS sales team will now face competition for the first time novartis will need a sales team to keep thinks going.

It is just Novartis does not value their sales teams because the current management really does not know what is done in the field. At one point there were to many reps but now it is down to bare bones.

No one said that in the current environment that nvs was going to eliminate sales people - that would be unilateral disarmament. But it is undeniable that the entire Pharma industry has and is increasingly decoupling its profitability from its sales force; the pharma sales per sales person in the industry has doubled in the last 20 years and the profitability has tripled. How? Pharma Sales people are now concentrated on higher profitability drugs where else they are applied smart companies do so smartly. These are FACTS that have been found and used by consultants across the industry. Novartis is a special case in that it has diversified and is no longer just a Pharma Company but a Consumer Healthcare company.

Burt, as stated above there is no doubt that all pharma's will keep most of their pharma sales forces in the short to medium term but fundamental economics, legislation and reasoning show that the trend shown above will continue and accelerate.

No one will argue that pharma companies need sales people to push second best drugs. Using the term second best may sound derogatory but these drugs do serve a purpose - if they are good enough the achieve the Dr's goals for the patients if prescribed they will hold down the price for the best drugs that would otherwise be prescribed. So the pharma sales person acts as a provider of market information that provides a service to the industry by adding competition.

But this only works in a positive way if there are no other price controls and a lack of information about the availability of alternative drugs. With the Affordable Care Act (ACA or otherwise known as Obama Care) this is not the case. For the 50% of the US Healthcare market served by private insurance there is a cap on the profitability of the insurance companies and an increase in the competition between them on the costs of the premiums that they charge.

So, if they are competing on costs of premiums that they charge, are limited in the amount of profit they can take, can provide information regarding alternative drugs and limit which kind of drugs that they will pay for how long do you think pharma companies will and can afford to pay sales people to push second best drugs?

Then, the Fed Govt will begin to negotiate as a buying group, the drugs it pays for in the other 50% of the US Healthcare market. So with the government basically dictating what drugs Dr's can prescribe and what they will cost in the ~ 50% of the market (Medicare, Medicaid etc) the same question arises.

There is no doubt that things are changing for pharma and will do so at at ever increasing rate and this changes will be amplified in marketing and sales.

If you doubt what I say, you should read the Kinsey etc consultants reports that are given to all the pharma leadership teams.

 

[Anonymous]

This fucker has pulled off the perfect corporate crime and the biggest at the same time. He was nothing. All he has going for him is his bipolar disease. It makes him crazy and super smart at the same tiem. The "smart" part is not smart in terms of say Bill Gates but in terms of Medoff and other devients who manipulated and defrauded others to get rich and even famous as this "celebrtiry" CEO thinks he has become.
All he did was married the niece of then Sandoz chairman of the board (apparently no one would she was ugly) and got on medication that brought out his deviant side. You know the rest of the story during his nazi regime lasting 17 years.
Now they are paying him for 7 years just as if he worked while no other employee ever got more than 2 years severance pay. Why is that? Not because he knows so much of biz that others would hire him and pay him big money. Are you kidding. No other bigpharmafia co would hire him for he has never been any factor in Novartis's "success" if you can call the crimnal behaviour of the company in all and every country they operate. Only in USA they got exposed to some extent but continue with the same shit criminal with impunity. That is the legacy of Vasella. His introduction of big time use of crime to enrich the company, impoverish the taxpayers and even kill some patients who were Rxed the right/approved medications for wrong indications.
This fucker knows so much about the criminality of Novartis that for that reason and that reason ONLY he is paid this hush money for so long. By the time it is over things will have been forgotten and he if still around will keep his fucking mouth shut (OMERTA for ever for a price) for ever.
Also by that time all the current criminlas who approved and participated in this crime will be out with ther own hush money for another 7 years. So you can imagine that no one will be able to prove anything in 14 years or care at all.
The only bright thing is that good Swiss people will vote to stop the crooks on Mar.3. That may be the begining of the trend spreading around the world to stop these criminals who have usurpted the economies and democracies in all the countries.
Those of you who think that globalization was such a good think, Vasellas of the world are direct result of it as are Novartis' of the world using any means to enrich themselves.
Mar. 3 may be the day the begingin of the end of globalization will happen. I hope so. How about you?

I did it may way.
D.V 2 U

 

[EVIL DAN VASELLA]

I did it may way.
D.V 2 U

GUESS HE DIDN'T , THEY ACTUALLY CALLED HIS EXTORTION EVIL

Novartis Scraps Non-Compete Payment to Departing Chairman

By JULIA WERDIGIER

Published: February 19, 2013

LONDON — Novartis, one of Switzerland’s biggest drug makers, said Tuesday it scrapped a planned $78 million payment to its departing chairman because of pressure from shareholders and lawmakers.

Novartis said it cancelled an agreement with Daniel Vasella to pay him 72 million Swiss francs over the next six years to keep him from sharing his knowledge with competitors. The decision comes three days before the company’s board is to face investors at the annual shareholder meeting.

“We continue to believe in the value of a non-compete, however, the decision to cancel the agreement and all related compensation addresses the concern of shareholders and other stakeholders,” Novartis’s vice chairman, Ulrich Lehner, said in a statement.

The size of the planned payment, which was revealed last Friday, had outraged investors just two weeks before a Swiss referendum to give shareholders more power to determine executive compensation. Mr. Vasella had previously said that he would step down as chairman at Novartis’s shareholder meeting on Friday.

In a statement on Tuesday, Mr. Vasella said he understood that many in Switzerland found the amount of the compensation “unreasonably high, despite the fact I had announced my intention to make the net amount available for philanthropic activities.”

On Friday, Mr. Vasella had said the annual payments were “according to fair market value” and that it had been important to Novartis that he refrains “from making my knowledge and know-how available to competitors and to take advantage of my experience with the company.”

Swiss lawmakers and shareholder activists criticized the company over the weekend and on Monday for not making the amount of the planned payment public earlier. They also contended that the payment was just the latest of several bad decisions by Novartis on executive pay.

Ethos, a Swiss group of investors, on Monday called on Novartis to immediately cancel the contract with Mr. Vasella and take back any money already paid.

Christophe Darbellay, president of the Christian Democratic People’s Party, told a Swiss newspaper, SonntagsZeitung, that Mr. Vasella’s compensation was “beyond evil.” Simonetta Sommaruga, the Swiss federal justice minister, told another newspaper, SonntagsBlick, that the payment was an “enormous blow for the social cohesion of our country” and that such “help-yourself mentality” was damaging confidence in the economy.

Even before the latest revelation, Mr. Vasella’s pay had been at the center of shareholder complaints. Mr. Vasella is currently receiving 12.4 million Swiss francs, or about $13.4 million, a year, according to the company’s 2012 annual report. The board has promised to consider changes in the way it pays its senior executives next year.

Pressure on companies to cut executive pay and give shareholders a greater say on the compensation levels is mounting. Recent opinion polls showed that Swiss voters were likely to approve changes at a referendum on March 3 that would effectively allow shareholders to determine executive pay. The referendum also proposes no payments when new executives join or executives leave, and no payments in advance.

At least five of Europe’s 20 highest-paid chief executives work for a Swiss company,

 

[Anonymous]

If this is true and will stand, this is the first piece of good news coming out of this evil man's activity. Only someone who suffers from mental illness of such naure that makes him capable of evil as this one has been, can manage to pull off a perfect corporate or any crime.But still there is justice in the end and people as such can not be fucked for ever. They came forward on all levels and thus the final act of this evil was terminated. Not enough but better than alternative. However since he has become known internationaly but even more importantly to Swiss for his wickedness, his case might be the straw that broke the camel's back. The good people of Swissland (this is how we should call them) will throw a book at him and his kind and the raign of CEO/excutive/new aristocracy terror will be over.
As thing are in today's societies the power elite has taken over everything, killed off the liberal class that used to stand up for the regular folks and completely usurped democracy to their convenience. Corporatism and corporate state rule and if we the people do not stand up for ourselves, they will have done us in. Reduce us to surfs and their slaves.
Vasellas of this world are the embodiment of this evil and this case may just be the begining of our uprising.
In Canada the native population has started a movement to protect their interests and their people who are treated like garbage by that country's govermants.
The name of the movement is: IDLE NO MORE!! Yes folks we too can join and do the right thing and be IDLE NO MORE. Everywhere. The time for IDLE NO MORE has come.

 

[Anonymous]

Leave it to Novartis to crew him too!!!

 

[Anonymous]

GUESS HE DIDN'T , THEY ACTUALLY CALLED HIS EXTORTION EVIL

Novartis Scraps Non-Compete Payment to Departing Chairman

By JULIA WERDIGIER

Published: February 19, 2013

LONDON — Novartis, one of Switzerland’s biggest drug makers, said Tuesday it scrapped a planned $78 million payment to its departing chairman because of pressure from shareholders and lawmakers.

Novartis said it cancelled an agreement with Daniel Vasella to pay him 72 million Swiss francs over the next six years to keep him from sharing his knowledge with competitors. The decision comes three days before the company’s board is to face investors at the annual shareholder meeting.

“We continue to believe in the value of a non-compete, however, the decision to cancel the agreement and all related compensation addresses the concern of shareholders and other stakeholders,” Novartis’s vice chairman, Ulrich Lehner, said in a statement.

The size of the planned payment, which was revealed last Friday, had outraged investors just two weeks before a Swiss referendum to give shareholders more power to determine executive compensation. Mr. Vasella had previously said that he would step down as chairman at Novartis’s shareholder meeting on Friday.

In a statement on Tuesday, Mr. Vasella said he understood that many in Switzerland found the amount of the compensation “unreasonably high, despite the fact I had announced my intention to make the net amount available for philanthropic activities.”

On Friday, Mr. Vasella had said the annual payments were “according to fair market value” and that it had been important to Novartis that he refrains “from making my knowledge and know-how available to competitors and to take advantage of my experience with the company.”

Swiss lawmakers and shareholder activists criticized the company over the weekend and on Monday for not making the amount of the planned payment public earlier. They also contended that the payment was just the latest of several bad decisions by Novartis on executive pay.

Ethos, a Swiss group of investors, on Monday called on Novartis to immediately cancel the contract with Mr. Vasella and take back any money already paid.

Christophe Darbellay, president of the Christian Democratic People’s Party, told a Swiss newspaper, SonntagsZeitung, that Mr. Vasella’s compensation was “beyond evil.” Simonetta Sommaruga, the Swiss federal justice minister, told another newspaper, SonntagsBlick, that the payment was an “enormous blow for the social cohesion of our country” and that such “help-yourself mentality” was damaging confidence in the economy.

Even before the latest revelation, Mr. Vasella’s pay had been at the center of shareholder complaints. Mr. Vasella is currently receiving 12.4 million Swiss francs, or about $13.4 million, a year, according to the company’s 2012 annual report. The board has promised to consider changes in the way it pays its senior executives next year.

Pressure on companies to cut executive pay and give shareholders a greater say on the compensation levels is mounting. Recent opinion polls showed that Swiss voters were likely to approve changes at a referendum on March 3 that would effectively allow shareholders to determine executive pay. The referendum also proposes no payments when new executives join or executives leave, and no payments in advance.

At least five of Europe’s 20 highest-paid chief executives work for a Swiss company,

This morning I was so pissed off when I read the news about the golden handshake for Mr....??? Vasella. I am more than glad to see now that it may be over.... And mainly that Vasella's kingdom is OVER!!!!!

 

[Anonymous]

Swiss lawmakers and shareholder activists criticized the company for not making the amount of the planned payment public earlier. They also contended that the payment was just the latest of several bad decisions by Novartis on executive pay.

 

[Anonymous]

This pay off or cash out is being felt by all of us under the novartis umbrella. We at the bottom of the food chain have been short changed from our increases/raises to compensate this dude......wow..smh

 

[Anonymous]

oh yes, i forgot to mention, woo hoo, way to keep and boost the moral and work ethic

 

[Anonymous]

Two more days till good people of Swissland cast their votes against the CEO's and other leeches looting the Swiss companies. Vasella, the leechest of the all, is a lighting rod for this movement for he pissed off everyone even the rich who should be on his side. Remember smart thieves never steal too much. If they do, as Vasella did all his "career" they get caught sooner or later. Unfortunately to all involved he got away with his thievery for 17 long and costly years.
Hopefully the voters will say YES overwhelmingly, so looters like Vasellas of this world will be stopped for ever. You see if the Swiss say YES the demand for control of these super thieves will spread all over the world. Something to look forward.