Kenneth Frazier
| Kenneth Frazier | |
|---|---|
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| Born |
Kenneth Carleton Frazier 17 December 1954 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |
| Occupation | Chairman, President and CEO of Merck & Co. (MSD) |
Kenneth Carleton Frazier (born December 17, 1954) is an American business executive. He is the chairman and CEO of the pharmaceutical company Merck & Co. (known as MSD outside of North America). After joining Merck & Co. as general counsel, he directed the company's defense against litigation over the anti-inflammatory drug Vioxx. Frazier is the second African-American to lead a major pharmaceutical company.
Kenneth Frazier was born on December 17, 1954, in North Philadelphia. His father, Otis, was a janitor. Frazier has said Thurgood Marshall was one of his heroes growing up. Frazier's mother died when he was twelve years old. He attended Northeast High School. After graduating at age 16, he entered Pennsylvania State University. To make extra money in college, he raised tadpoles and newts and sold them to local stores.
After earning his B.A. from Penn State, Frazier enrolled at Harvard University to study law. He graduated in 1978 with a J.D.
After graduating from Harvard, Frazier started his law career at Drinker Biddle & Reath in Philadelphia. In 1991, Esther Lardent, head of the Death Penalty Representation Project, asked Frazier to defend death row inmate James Willie "Bo" Cochran. Cochran had been arrested and accused of murdering an assistant manager at a Birmingham grocery store in 1976. Frazier, then a partner at Drinker Biddle, and two colleagues took the case. In 1995, after 19 years on death row, the 11th United States Courts of Appeals overturned Cochran's conviction. In 1997, Cochran was retried and found not guilty. Frazier continued to represent him after leaving Drinker Biddle. During Frazier's law career, he also took four summer sabbaticals to teach trial advocacy in South Africa.
As a lawyer at Drinker Biddle, one of Frazier's clients was Merck & Co., the second-largest drug company in the United States. In 1992, he joined Merck & Co.'s public affairs division as general counsel. Frazier was named senior general counsel in 1999. As general counsel, he was credited with overseeing the company's defense against claims that the anti-inflammatory drug Vioxx had caused heart attacks and strokes. Analysts at the time estimated Merck & Co.'s liability to range from 20 to 50 billion dollars. Frazier said the case was "the most significant challenge [he'd] ever faced." He chose to fight all cases in court rather than settle them all quickly. The remaining cases were settled in 2007 for $4.85 billion.
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