FRANKFURT: Leading pharmaceutical company Hoechst Marion Roussel
has appointed Armin Frohmann as its new head of global employee
communications.
The post has been vacant since Peter Wiegand left in April to work with
parent company Hoechst as head of advertising.
Frohmann’s appointment last month comes as Hoechst Marion Roussel
develops its internal communications, over a year after it was created
from the merger of three big pharmaceutical firms. He will oversee a
team of four in Frankfurt, serving 40,000 employees in 120 countries
across the world.
He will report to Thomas Quinn, Hoechst Marion Roussel’s global
communications head, and work with the firm’s local communications
managers in more than 20 countries.
Hoechst Marion Roussel was formed in July 1997 from the merger of German
firm Hoechst Pharma, US company Marion Merrell Dow and French company
Roussel Uclaf. Frohmann has been charged with creating a single company
culture for Hoechst Marion Roussel.
He said: ’The goal of employee communications is to help employees
understand management’s efforts to develop a single corporate culture
worldwide.’ He added that he would look at hiring an agency to support
his internal communications strategy.
Frohmann joins from car manufacturer Audi, where he was head of
editorial services and government affairs for two years. He previously
worked for German agency Topcom and Burson-Marsteller’s German
operation.
HMR’s top selling drugs are Cardizem, which treats hypertension,
Trental, for vascular disorders and the Delix family of drugs, also used
to treat hypertension.