AstraZeneca plc has announced that Rene Haas and Birgit Conix have been appointed as non-executive directors, with effect from 1 January 2025 and 1 February 2025 respectively. On appointment, Conix will join the audit committee.

Rene Haas is CEO of Arm, having been at the semiconductor and software design company company since October 2013. Prior to this, he held several applications management, applications engineering and product engineering roles, including seven years at NVIDIA as vice president and general manager. He has also held executive roles at Scintera Networks and Tensilica. Haas sits on the boards of Arm China and SoftBank Group.

Birgit Conix is chief financial officer of Sonova, a global company specialising in hearing care, which she joined in 2021. She was previously CFO of tourism company TUI and, before that, CFO of the Belgian media, cable and telecommunications business Telenet Group from 2013 until 2018. She has also held various senior positions in Johnson & Johnson, Heineken, Tenneco and Reed Elsevier. Conix is also a member of the supervisory board of ASML, a manufacturer of chip-making equipment in the semiconductor industry, where she is chair of the ESG committee and a member of the audit committee.

Michel Demaré, chair of AstraZeneca, said: “I am confident Rene and Birgit will be excellent additions to the AstraZeneca Board. We look forward to welcoming them as we continue the process of refreshing the Board in anticipation of four current non-executive directors reaching nine years’ tenure in the coming years.

“Rene brings deep and broad knowledge of technology including data science, computing and AI from his numerous years’ experience in the microprocessor, semiconductor and software engineering industry, and experience of leading a large Cambridge, UK-based technology company.

“Birgit’s financial and executive experience through successive CFO roles over the last decade, together with her 15 years’ experience of the pharmaceutical industry prior to that, will enable her to contribute to the audit committee’s and board’s work from the outset.

“Both Rene and Birgit bring to AstraZeneca’s board significant international experience in senior executive roles at large global businesses.”