Achillion Pharmaceuticals, Inc. announced that Joseph Truitt, the Company's President and Chief Operating Officer, has been named Chief Executive Officer and will be appointed to the Company's Board of Directors. Milind S. Deshpande, will be stepping down from his role as Chief Executive Officer and resigning from the Board of Directors. Mr. Truitt has led Achillion's business development and commercial strategy since joining the Company in 2009.

He joined Achillion from Viropharma, after its acquisition of Lev Pharmaceuticals, where he led the build-out of commercial infrastructure and the strategy for the launch of Cinryze®. He was previously responsible for sales and commercial operations at Johnson and Johnson's OraPharma subsidiary. Dr. Deshpande has been at Achillion for 17 years, the last five as CEO, and under his leadership, the Company transformed from its previous focus on anti-infectives to discovering and developing its first-in-class complement Factor D platform.