NuVasive Names CEO

San Diego, Calif.-based spinal firm NuVasive Inc. appointed Gregory T. Lucier as its CEO, effective immediately. Lucier has served as interim CEO since April 1 following the abrupt resignation of former CEO Alex Lukianov. An internal investigation revealed that Lukianov failed to comply with company reimbursement and personnel policies.

Lucier will continue to service as chairman of NuVasive’s board.

“Since being appointed Interim CEO, Greg has hit the ground running with an intense focus on driving NuVasive’s industry leadership,” said Jack R. Blair, lead independent director of the NuVasive board. “As the board considered the needs of the company, we determined that this focus as well as Greg’s broad healthcare and leadership experience made him the right person to lead NuVasive forward. In addition to having a solid understanding of our strategy and business as a director, Greg brings a record of execution in areas that are also areas of strategic growth for NuVasive, including driving cutting-edge innovation, increased operational efficiencies and targeted expansion in key markets and geographies. With the support of our talented team of employee share owners, we are confident that Greg will apply his skill set to the spine market to also drive compelling growth and value creation at NuVasive.”

Lucier has served as a member of the NuVasive board since December 2013. From May 2003 to February 2014, Lucier served as chairman and CEO of Life Technologies, a global life-sciences company acquired by Thermo Fisher Scientific in 2014. During his 11-year tenure at Life Technologies, he led the company from a small startup known as Invitrogen in 2003, directed the acquisition and merger of Invitrogen with Applied Biosystems in 2008 into the renamed Life Technologies, and then transformed the organization by 2013 into a global, world-leading biotechnology firm with 50,000 products, 12,000 employees and nearly $4 billion in sales in more than 180 countries.

Lucier previously was a corporate officer of General Electric and served as an executive at GE Medical Systems.

He received a bachelor’s degree in engineering from Pennsylvania State University and a masters of business administration from Harvard Business School. In addition to serving on the board of NuVasive, Lucier serves as the board chairman for Sanford Burnham Medical Research Institute, is a member of the Catalent Inc. board of directors and is a former director of CareFusion Corporation, now part of Becton, Dickinson & Co.

“NuVasive benefits from a dedicated and passionate team, a culture of innovation and strong surgeon customer relationships. I am excited to work as CEO alongside NuVasive’s exceptional management team and more than 1,500 employee share owners around the world to capitalize on the strength of the company’s market share-taking strategies, integrated procedural offerings and significant growth potential,” said Lucier. “Together, we are committed to scaling our business and more efficiently deploying resources, rapidly growing our presence outside the U.S. and leading innovation in the spine market through the introduction of game-changing technologies such as our recently launched Integrated Global Alignment platform. We have a tremendous amount of opportunity ahead of us, and I am confident in our ability to accelerate our positive momentum and continue to generate value for our shareholders in 2015 and beyond.”