Novo Nordisk, a Danish pharma group, has named Pinder Sahota as its new general manager and corporate vice president, UK, it was reported yesterday.

Sahota, who brings experience from business, commercial and leadership roles to Novo, was most recently responsible for creating commercial and market development strategies across Europe as senior vice president of market and commercial development for Europe at Smith & Nephew.

He began his pharmaceutical career in sales and marketing with companies that formed Sanofi Aventis, then moved to SmithKline Beecham, now GlaxoSmithKline, where he held a number of commercial leadership roles including vice president of commercial operations of diabetes and cardiovascular. In 2009 Sahota moved to AstraZeneca to take up the role of vice president for primary care in the UK, and was in that position until moving to the role of managing director for the UK and Ireland for Smith & Nephew in 2013.