MedImmune’s Mott heads for the exit

David Mott, the CEO of MedImmune who led his company through a $15.6 billion buyout by AstraZeneca, is leaving the company a year after the deal closed. Mott says he's leaving for personal reasons and not because of any management disagreements. Following the AstraZeneca buyout, MedImmune was tapped to head the pharma giant's biologics work, integrating Cambridge Antibody Technology with the Maryland developer. Tony Zook, who heads AstraZeneca's North American operation, will take Mott's place until a successor is named.

The buyout didn't sit well with all the analysts several of whom said AstraZeneca paid too much. And one anonymous analyst told Thomson Financial that with Mott out of the picture AstraZeneca had lost a potentially strong successor to AstraZeneca CEO David Brennan.

- read the story from Thomson Financial