Varian (NYSE: VAR) announced today that CEO Dow Wilson will retire after Siemens Healthineers‘ planned $16.4 billion acquisition of the company, which is expected to close in the first half of this year.
Wilson, who has been with Varian for 16 years, will serve as a special advisor to Siemens Healthineers (Frankfurt: SHL) to help support the integration. Varian COO Chris Toth will become CEO of Siemens Healthineers’ new Varian business segment.
“Since his appointment as CEO in 2012, Dow has led Varian’s efforts to define a new era in cancer care,” Varian board chair Andrew Eckert said in a news release.
“In addition to significantly extending the company’s market leadership and innovation in radiation therapy, he oversaw Varian’s progress in bringing artificial intelligence, machine learning and cloud solutions to the fight against cancer. Through this strategic transformation, Varian has achieved double-digit growth and created 4,000 jobs over the last five years, and importantly, has enabled more successful outcomes for millions of patients worldwide.”
Siemens Healthineers and Varian say the planned merger will create the most comprehensive cancer care portfolio in the industry.
“We have made incredible advances in the fight against cancer, and our transformational combination with Siemen Healthineers will bring us even closer to achieving our vision of a world without fear of cancer,” Wilson said.
Siemens Healthineers CEO Bernd Montag congratulated Toth on LinkedIn, saying that Varian will have an incredibly strong leadership team going forward.
