Why Ex-Mayor Peterson is Stepping Down From Eli Lilly After 7 Years On the Job

March 7, 2017
By Alex Keown, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff

INDIANAPOLIS – Former Indianapolis Bart Peterson is stepping down from his role as a senior vice president of corporate affairs and communication at Eli Lilly to “pursue personal business interests and expand his community volunteer commitments,” Eli Lilly announced last week.

Peterson is a former two-term mayor of Indianapolis. He joined the company in 2009 and a search has been launched for Peterson’s replacement. Peterson’s last day with the company is set for March 31.

While Lilly did not provide too many details of Peterson’s plans, politics is playing a key role in his decision to leave the company. In an interview with the Indianapolis Business Journal, Peterson said the election of Donald Trump and his criticisms and attacks on the pharmaceutical industry were factors.

Since the election, Trump has been critical of the pharmaceutical industry for conducting much of its manufacturing overseas and for pricing practices. In January before he was sworn in as president, Trump said the drug companies are “getting away with murder” when it comes to the prices the companies charge for medication. During an address to a joint session of Congress earlier this month, Trump announced the intention to introduce a plan to replace the Affordable Care Act and bring down healthcare costs and the “artificially high price of drugs.”

Part of Peterson’s role at Lilly was overseeing federal affairs and lobbying. Peterson said as a well-known Democrat, it made sense for him to step aside from his role with a new Republican administration and Congress in Washington.

“The U.S. is the most important market that Lilly has, and the most important market for the global pharmaceutical industry. It’s the beginning of a whole new set of issues and challenges when a new administration comes in. And so the political element of it was probably not the biggest consideration [to leave Lilly], but for me, at least, it was some consideration,” Peterson said, according to the IBJ.

It wasn’t just politics though that helped Peterson make his decision to leave Eli Lilly. He also pointed to the fact the company has a new chief executive officer. On Jan. 1, David Ricks took over for longtime CEO John C. Lechleiter. Peterson told the Journal that Ricks deserved to form his own leadership team, which meant he had to step aside.

But, unlike some executives who step down from a role only to emerge a few days later with a new position in another company, Peterson said he was not looking for any new job. At 58 years old, he said his plan is to “have no definite plan.”

“What I’m really trying to say is I’m not looking for a job,” Peterson told the Journal, “and I won’t take a job for some time to come.”