Pitt Business

Home > Alumni > News and Alumni Profiles > Carrington Carter (MBA '08)

Alumni Corner: Carrington Carter (MBA '08) promoted at Bristol-Myers Squibb

Carrington Carter (MBA '08) has been named product manager of the oncology franchise marketing team at Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS), a global biopharmaceutical company that had $19.5 billion in sales in 2010.

In this role, Carter is responsible for driving strategy and building innovative capabilities for the promotion of four different cancer drugs. He is focused on shifting doctors from the perspective of seeing the BMS drugs as individual brands to seeing the products as part of the company's oncology franchise.

"Our products have immediate impact. They can extend people's lives," says Carter, who lives in North Brunswick, New Jersey, a short distance from the company's marketing headquarters in Plainsboro, New Jersey.

Carter says he enjoys his new position because it entails working with larger teams of people. Before, Carter worked with "mature" products that were toward the end of their patent expiration, and therefore had much smaller marketing teams.

Before his September promotion, Carter was the product manager for the blood pressure medication, Avapro/Avalide. In his three years with BMS, Carter has also managed an anticoagulant, an injectible antibiotic, and a corticosteroid.

Carter says the experience of handling marketing for a variety of therapeutic drugs has helped him grow in the company. He has addressed such business problems as reintroducing products to the market, mitigating the effects of a product recall and supply shortage, and implementing direct-mail campaigns for target physicians and nurses.

For his work on re-launching the antibiotic Azactam, Carter was honored with a President's Award, a recognition that comes from the U.S. division president of BMS.

"The pharmaceuticals industry is so complex. Each experience brings with it different touch points across a variety of functional areas and the wide continuum of patient care," Carter says.

Looking back at his time at the Katz School, Carter credits the Career Services department for encouraging him to attend the National Black MBA Association conference. That led to a 10-week internship at BMS and ultimately a full-time job.

"I can honestly say that going to Pitt was one of the best professional decisions I've ever made. It's a great school, has a great faculty, and prepares you for life in the real world. My classmates provided the right balance of cooperation and competition," Carter says.