Legend Biotech Appoints Former Novartis China President Zhang Ying as CEO From September 15, 2026

On September 15, 2026, CAR-T cell therapy company Legend Biotech announced that its board has appointed Zhang Ying as chief executive officer, effective September 15, 2026. Zhang succeeds Alan Bash, who has served as interim chief executive since July 2026 and will continue as president of the CARVYKTI business. Before joining Legend Biotech, Zhang served as chief commercial officer of Novartis International. She spent more than 15 years at Novartis.

Early in her career, Zhang held leadership roles at AstraZeneca, Pfizer and McKinsey, and joined Novartis in 2011, going on to hold senior management positions including president of Novartis Pharmaceuticals China and president of Novartis Innovative Medicines China. From October 1, 2023, she served as president and managing director of Novartis China, during which Novartis China grew into the group's second-largest market globally. In 2023, Novartis China generated revenue of USD 3.3 billion, up 17% year on year, ranking among the top three multinational pharmaceutical companies in China by revenue, behind only Merck & Co. and AstraZeneca in China. From June 1, 2024, Zhang was appointed chief commercial officer of Novartis International Business, leading the company's commercial launch strategy team. In August 2026, an internal Novartis notice showed that Zhang had left the company.

In the second quarter of 2026, ciltacabtagene autoleucel net sales were approximately USD 657 million, up 50% year on year, with net sales in the United States rising 32% year on year and net sales outside the United States rising 128% year on year. The product has been launched in 348 centers across 19 markets worldwide. In the second quarter of 2026, Legend Biotech reported net income of USD 33.2 million, compared with a net loss of USD 125.4 million in the same period of 2025, swinging to profit and improving by USD 158.6 million year on year. The company disclosed that the improvement was mainly due to a decrease in unrealized foreign exchange losses compared with the same period of 2025 and to gross profit growth from ciltacabtagene autoleucel.

On September 10, 2026, David Samra, a major shareholder of Novartis Pharmaceuticals, called for a board reshuffle and proposed changing the company's approach to overseeing deals. Novartis had spent USD 12 billion to acquire US biotech company Avidity, gaining a drug for treating muscular dystrophy, but the drug's Phase III clinical trial failed. As a result, Novartis shares fell more than 10% in a single day on September 8, 2026, wiping out nearly USD 30 billion in market value, the largest single-day decline since March 2020. Novartis acquired German biotech company MorphoSys in 2024, and only months after completing the acquisition, Novartis recorded an impairment on the deal.

Novartis's disclosed 2026 interim report showed first-half net sales of USD 27.521 billion, down 2% year on year at constant exchange rates; core operating income of USD 10.837 billion, down 7% year on year; and net income of USD 6.413 billion, down 17% year on year. Over the same period, Novartis China sales reached USD 2.5 billion, up 7% year on year.