Astellas has promoted Moyra Knight to executive director of communications and corporate citizenship, it said on Wednesday.
Knight was previously senior director of corporate and employee communications at the Japan-based pharma company. In this newly created role, she will oversee corporate, employee, and product communications, along with issues management, corporate reputation, corporate citizenship, digital and social media, while continuing to serve as president of the Astellas U.S.A. Foundation.
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“We thought it made a lot of sense to create great coordination between the corporate communications side of the house with the work that is happening in product communications in the business unit,” Knight said. “My role expanded in a couple ways. The business unit of communications is new to our team and we are taking on more responsibility around charitable and philanthropic work.”
She will lead a team of 10, covering comms for the U.S., Canada, Brazil, Colombia, and for Astellas’ Latin American partners. She officially started in the role on Monday, reporting to SVP of corporate affairs Jeffrey Winton.
“For the last several years, our focus has been on instilling the best practices in communications at Astellas,” Knight said. “For me now, it’s all about continuing that great momentum, making sure that the Astellas brand is really understood and more recognized, certainly throughout the Americas.”
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Knight has worked at Astellas for three years. Previously, she spent six years at medical devices manufacturer Baxter in comms leadership roles. Earlier in her career, Knight worked at Ogilvy, Kraft Foods, and Leo Burnett.
The company also promoted Karl Uhlendorf to senior director of policy and government communications and Andrew Lewis to senior director of medical and development communications.
This story was first published in PRWeek.
