Britain’s second-biggest drugmaker GSK has announced the departure of its chief executive, Dame Emma Walmsley, after eight years in the top job.
Walmsley, 56, who has run the FTSE 100 company since 2017, will step down from the board at the end of this year, and remain at GSK until her notice period ends on 30 September 2026. It is unclear what she will do then, but she said she had no intention of retiring.
Luke Miels, GSK’s chief commercial officer whom she brought in from rival AstraZeneca in 2017 and described as a “dream appointment” in her diary, will replace her and starts on 1 January.
Walmsley, who joined the company from L’Oréal in 2010 and ran its consumer healthcare business before being promoted to the top job, pushed through a shake-up of the group, including the 2022 spin-off of its consumer arm, now called Haleon, with brands such as Sensodyne, Panadol and Advil – its biggest corporate restructure in two decades.
GSK’s pipeline of new drugs has lagged behind rivals but she slimmed it down to focus on the “real winners” and sharpened its focus on respiratory, immunology, inflammation and cancer medicines, as well as vaccines. She ramped up spending on research and development to £6.4bn last year, including £1.5bn in the UK.
Walmsley said: “2026 is a pivotal year for GSK to define its path for the decade ahead, and I believe the right moment for new leadership.
Miels, an Australian who has a degree in biology and worked for Roche and Sanofi-Aventis in the US, Europe and Asia in the past, had been touted as an eventual successor. Walmsley came under intense pressure in 2021 from the activist investor Elliott Management, a US hedge fund, which criticised years of underperformance of the drugmaker and her lack of scientific background, and demanded that she reapply for her job.
However, she successfully fended off pressure from Elliott, and GSK later rebuffed takeover offers for its consumer healthcare arm from Dove maker Unilever, valuing it at £50bn.
One of Britain’s best-known businesswomen, Walmsley joined the prime minister’s business council in mid-2023 under Rishi Sunak and recently attended the state banquet at Windsor Castle during Donald Trump’s visit to the UK.
She is one of the highest-paid chief executives in the UK, with a £10.6m total package last year including a £1.6m salary, down from £12.7m in 2023 as a result of lower bonuses. The company said in February that she could get a maximum package of £21.6m this year that would partly pay out in three years’ time, in an attempt to offer US-style pay packets to top executives. She has been paid almost £66m during her years at the helm.
Miels will receive a lower salary of £1.38m, and is in line for a total package of up to £16.6m including long-time share bonuses.
Walmsley’s departure will leave the FTSE 100 with just seven female chief executives: Milena Mondini de Focatiis at Admiral, Amanda Blanc at Aviva, Allison Kirkby at BT, Stella David at Entain, Liv Garfield at Severn Trent, Louise Beardmore at United Utilities and Margherita Della Valle at Vodafone.
The GSK chair, Sir Jonathan Symonds, thanked Walmsley for her “outstanding leadership in delivering a strategic transformation of GSK, including the successful demerger of Haleon” and said the business had a “bright and ambitious future”.
GSK expects to launch 15 blockbuster medicines between now and 2031, taking annual revenues to more than £40bn, from £31bn at present. However, the share price performance has been lacklustre, as investors worry about patents expiring in its HIV business. The company also has no presence in the fast-growing anti-obesity market.
“The new CEO appointment is likely to shift sentiment positively,” said analysts at Bank of America. “Miels has a strong pharma focus at a time where business is shifting to speciality drivers.”
Walmsley’s departure comes at a difficult time in the pharmaceutical industry, as Trump has threatened to impose new tariffs this week on branded drugs.
Drugmakers are also locked in a row with the UK government over pricing of new medicines, and other companies – AstraZeneca along with MSD and Eli Lilly of the US – have either paused or scrapped important investments in the UK.
GSK has stressed its commitment to the UK, while also announcing new investment in manufacturing and research in the US two weeks ago. On Monday, AstraZeneca said it was preparing to directly list its shares on the New York Stock Exchange but would remain listed in London.
