Schering-ploughs Hassan May Get Exit Package Worth $60 Million
On the basis of Hassans compensation in 2007, he would receive $45.2 million in stock payouts and $14.7 million to cover taxes, according to a regulatory filing in April by Kenilworth, New Jersey-based Schering-Plough. The actual amount may differ according to Hassans 2008 pay, which the company hasnt disclosed, and changes in the share price.
Merck, based in Whitehouse Station, New Jersey, agreed on March 9 to buy Schering-Plough in a deal valued at $41.1 billion to gain experimental drugs for blood clots, cancer, and schizophrenia. Hassan, 63, plans to stay until the transaction closes, which the companies expect by Dec. 31. Schering-Plough wont comment on the CEOs pay until a company regulatory filing addresses it, said Ken Banta, a spokesman for the drugmaker.
Hassan hasnt indicated what hell do next. The sale burnishes his reputation as the drug industrys dealmaker. He engineered the $37 billion takeover in March 2000 of Monsanto Co. by Pharmacia & Upjohn, forming Pharmacia Corp. In April 2003 he sold Pharmacia to New York-based Pfizer Inc., the worlds largest drugmaker, for $58 billion.
Hassan was born in Pakistan, the son of a senior civil servant and a womens-rights advocate, and began his career in 1970 as a drug salesman.
Before joining Pharmacia & Upjohn in 1997, Hassan was an executive vice president of American Home Products Corp., now part of Wyeth. Earlier he headed the U.S. operation of Sandoz, now a unit of Basel, Switzerland-based Novartis AG.
If Hassan is fired before or after the Schering-Plough buyout concludes, he would instead get a $17.5 million severance payment and a $19.5 million pension as well as $144,585 in health-care benefits, all based on his 2007 pay, the filing said.