CHICAGO — The ADM board of directors has nominated Ellen de Brabander, Ph.D., executive vice president for innovation and regulatory affairs at Elanco, to stand for election to the board at the company’s annual stockholders’ meeting May 4.

“Our board’s leadership has been critical to our portfolio transformation, and with the addition of Ellen de Brabander we’re adding new expertise to help power our growth,” said Juan Luciano, chairman and chief executive officer at ADM. “Ellen brings a broad scientific background and deep R&D and innovation experience in human nutrition, life sciences and animal health — which align well with many of the growth opportunities ADM is pursuing.”

Ellen de Brabander, Ph.D. executive vice president for innovation and regulatory affairs at Elanco. | Source: Business Wire 

In her current role at Elanco, a global leader in animal health products and services, de Brabander drives early and late-stage pipeline execution across pet health and farm animals, including nutritional health solutions. She previously was senior vice president for research and development at PepsiCo, with companywide responsibility for food safety, quality, regulatory, and digital transformation in R&D, and before that, for all product innovations for the nutrition category. 

De Brabander also has held executive leadership positions in Boehringer Ingelheim (then known as Merial), Merck Animal Health (previously Intervet) and DSM. De Brabander holds a doctorate degree in bio-organic chemistry from Leiden University in The Netherlands, having completed post-doctoral work in molecular biology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 

She has co-authored more than 60 publications in scientific journals, holds 18 patents, and has received multiple awards for her research, including the Golden Medal from the Royal Dutch Chemical Society in 2000 for Best Chemist under 40. She was a founding board member of the European Institute of Technology and founding chief executive officer of EIT Food, the largest public-private partnership in the food sector.

ADM also announced that Donald Felsinger, lead director, will retire from the board, having reached the retirement age of 75. Francisco Sanchez, a member of the board since 2014, also will not stand for re-election at the annual meeting.

Read more about personnel changes throughout the industry.