Dean Paranicas, the highly respected and impactful CEO of the HealthCare Institute of New Jersey for more than a decade, will announce Monday that he is retiring, effective March 1, 2024, ROI-NJ has learned.
Paranicas, who assumed the leadership at HINJ in March 2011 after a three-decade career in various roles at BD, said he is proud to have spent a lifetime in health care — working to improve the lives of patients in a variety of ways.
“It has been my distinct honor and privilege to have been a part of an industry for over 40 years with such a noble calling — to improve the human condition,” he said.
Doing so in New Jersey has been extra special, he said.
“New Jersey’s life sciences community is a pillar not only of our state’s workforce and economy, but also of global human health,” he said. “I’m proud of HINJ’s many achievements during my tenure, and I am grateful for the opportunity to have worked on them so closely with many of the state’s thought leaders and policymakers in state and federal government, academia, industry, the national life sciences community and, most importantly, the patient community, who are the ultimate beneficiaries of our industry’s work.”
Paranicas was lauded by Chris Lepore, the chair of the HINJ and a vice president at Johnson & Johnson.
“Over his long and successful tenure at HINJ, Dean has been a prominent and powerful advocate and voice for New Jersey’s life sciences community, patient access and strengthening our state’s world-class innovation ecosystem during particularly challenging times for the industry and global health,” he said. “His steady stewardship of an effective and well-respected organization enabled HINJ to adapt and respond to new and ever-changing public policy environments on both the federal and state levels.
“Dean has built an enduring legacy at HINJ in New Jersey, Washington, D.C., and nationally.”
Paranicas is a Jersey guy through and through.
He earned his undergraduate degree at Rutgers University, where he was a member of Phi Beta Kappa. He earned his J.D. from Rutgers-Newark School of Law, where he was editor of the Rutgers Law Review. He began his career at McCarter & English in Newark.
Paranicas is a co-chair of We Work for Health – New Jersey, is a member of the board at New Jersey Innovation Institute and serves on the advisory board of Biotechnology High School in Freehold.
He also is a former chair of the Rutgers board of trustees, where he is now a trustee emeritus.
The job of finding his successor will be challenging.
Lepore said HINJ will be conducting a thorough and comprehensive search process to identify the most qualified candidate to succeed Paranicus in leading the organization’s critically important work of protecting patient access while preserving the innovation ecosystem that works to discover new treatments and cures for the world’s most dreaded conditions.
“We are indebted to Dean for his years of inspired and energetic leadership and look forward to continuing HINJ’s legacy of strong and effective advocacy under his successor,” Lepore said.
