John Driscoll is out as president of Walgreens' U.S. healthcare business and will be replaced by a health tech executive.
Mary Langowski, who has served as CEO of Solera Health since 2020, will take over the role in March. Driscoll, who joined Walgreens in 2022 under former CEO Rosalind Brewer, will move into an advisory role, the company said Thursday.
Related: How Walgreens’ John Driscoll plans to make VillageMD profitable
Solera Health works with payers and employers to develop wellness programs. Langowski was chief strategy and corporate development officer at CVS Health from 2014 to 2016, before its acquisition of Aetna.
The announcement continues the shakeup in Walgreens' C-suite since Brewer stepped down as CEO in September and former Cigna executive Tim Wentworth was hired to replace her. Wentworth has made it clear he is not adverse to making big changes, including pushing forward with a $1 billion cost-cutting plan that was announced less than two weeks before his arrival.
In November, Walgreens announced plans to cut 5% of its corporate workforce, just six months after an initial round of layoffs that involved about 500 corporate jobs. A week ago, the company said it is eliminating 145 more jobs.
On an earnings call last month, Wentworh said he came to his job "eyes wide open, with a clear mandate to act with everything on the table in terms of putting our business on the right track.".
The strategy of Walgreen's healthcare services business, identified as a key growth opportunity for the chain, has been under intense scrutiny in recent months.
The segment—which includes primary care provider VillageMD, specialty pharmacy Shields Health Solutions and home care company CareCentrix—reported a $436 million operating loss in the first quarter of Walgreens' fiscal 2024, flat with a year ago.
Driscoll was charged with making the segment, particularly VillageMD, more profitable. In an interview last month, he said VillageMD was "well behind where we expected it to be."
Walgreens has poured billions of dollars into its healthcare services strategy, with mixed results. In 2021, the company invested $5.2 billion in VillageMD and roughly $300 million in CareCentrix to take a majority stake in both operations. It spent about $1.4 billion in 2022 to take full ownership of Shields Health Solutions, though it is now exploring a sale.
Walgreens said Driscoll will be "working closely" with Langowski and other executives in the coming weeks. Neither executive was made available for an interview.
The company's C-suite has seen a lot of turnover in the past six months. Besides Brewer's exit, former CFO James Kehoe resigned in August to join financial-technology company FIS Global. Former Chief Information Officer Hsiao Wang also left the company in October after about a year and was replaced by Neal Sample, former CIO at Northwestern Mutual. Former Chief Marketing Officer Linh Peters left Walgreens in November.
On Thursday, Walgreens also announced the appointment of interim Chief Financial Officer Manmohan Mahajan to the permanent role and named former Hanesbrands executive Elizabeth Burger as chief human resources officer.
