Schwan plans to scrutinize Genentech pay

When Roche originally swooped in to acquire all of Genentech, the pharma giant was careful to leave the company's compensation system intact. But when 2011 rolls around, things may change a little.

Roche CEO Severin Schwan says that reviewing Genentech's pay packages--long the envy of the biotech world--will become one of his top priorities in 2010, according to a report in the Financial Times. In the brave new world ahead Schwan said that he expects that the pay at Genentech will be more incentive-based than in the rest of the company. And the workers in the biotech arm will get a higher percentage of their pay in long-term stock options. The new pay deal, he says, will have to be more "entrepreneurial."

Message to Roche employees: Don't look for a similar deal.

"If you want a person who always plays it safe, probably they should not work for Genentech," said Schwan. "But I think it would be wrong to import the US system to the rest of the world."

- read the story [1] in the Financial Times

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