Copenhagen, 2011-09-01 09:00 CEST (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- 

Company Announcement

No. 14/2011

                                        

ZealandPharma strengthens its Executive Management team with the appointment of
                   Dr Arvind Hundal as Chief Business Officer

Copenhagen, 1 September 2011: Zealand Pharma A/S (NASDAQ OMX: ZEAL), a Danish
biopharmaceutical company dedicated to the discovery and development of
innovative peptide drugs, today announced that it has appointed Dr Arvind M.
Hundal to the position of Senior Vice President, Chief Business Officer. Dr
Hundal, who joined Zealand Pharma in August 2009 as Vice President of Business
Development, will join the company's Executive Management with immediate
effect. 

Dr. Hundal has a BS from King's College London, University of London, a PhD
from the Institute of Genetics at Glasgow University and subsequently completed
a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical
Center in Dallas. Before joining Zealand Pharma, Dr. Hundal held the position
as Business Development Director at 7TM Pharma A/S, and prior to that served as
a member of the Strategic Planning Business Development organization at
AstraZeneca. Dr. Hundal has over 15 years of experience in the life sciences
sector, at least 10 of which have been in a business development role, working
on both in- and out-licensing across the industry from pre-seed start-up
companies and spinout biotechnology to large top-tier pharmaceutical companies.
She has worked on deals covering a large array of compounds and technologies
spanning a wide range of therapeutic areas including gastrointestinal,
metabolic, cardiovascular, oncology, virology, inflammatory conditions and the
central nervous system. 

David H. Solomon, President and CEO of Zealand Pharma, commented:

“Arvind has been instrumental in the success of Zealand Pharma's business
development activities, most recently for the agreement that we signed with
Boehringer Ingelheim in June this year. Active partnering is a cornerstone of
our business, and I am pleased that Arvind now joins Zealand's Executive
Management team where her deep understanding of the international life sciences
industry and her skills and broad-based experience in licensing will help to
ensure that we maximize the value of our drug pipeline.” 

On 25 August, Dr Hundal won the BiotechBuilder of the Year Award for 2011 at
the 9TH annual BiotechBuilders Medicon Valley Event for her recent achievements
at Zealand Pharma. BiotechBuilders is an independent networking organisation
for pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and medical technology companies bringing
together executives, other business professionals, entrepreneurs, investors and
service providers with the objective of facilitating growth in the healthcare
industry. 



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For further information, please contact:

David H. Solomon, President and Chief Executive Officer

Tel: +45 2220 6360

Hanne Leth Hillman, Vice President for IR & Corporate Communication

Tel: +45 5060 3689



About Zealand Pharma

Zealand Pharma A/S is a public (NASDAQ OMX: ZEAL) biopharmaceutical company
based in Copenhagen, Denmark with a mature and growing clinical pipeline of
innovative peptide based drugs. The company's lead product is Lyxumia®
(lixisenatide), a once-daily GLP-1 agonist licensed to Sanofi, which has
Lyxumia® in late-stage Phase III development for the treatment of Type 2
diabetes. Zealand Pharma also has a collaboration with Boehringer Ingelheim
covering glucagon/GLP-1 dual agonists, including ZP2929 for the treatment of
diabetes and obesity, and a licence agreement with Helsinn Healthcare on
elsiglutide, a clinical stage GLP-2 drug for the treatment of chemotherapy- and
radiotherapy-induced diarrhea. 

Zealand Pharma specializes in the discovery, optimization and development of
novel peptide drugs with favorable therapeutic attributes, and all drug
candidates in its pipeline have been identified through the company's own drug
discovery activities. Zealand Pharma's products target disease areas where
existing treatments fail to adequately serve patient needs and where the market
potential for improved treatments through the use of peptide drugs is high.