The drugmaker’s head of pharma (pictured in the middle) is leaving in February, declining to take a board seat as a consolation prize for losing the race to succeed JP Garnier as ceo. The other loser, Chris Viehbacher (at right), who runs US pharma, accepted the offer and joins the board on Jan. 31.

As noted previously, Glaxo directors are keen to stabilize the drugmaker after the disruption caused by the long-running and high-profile succession race. David Stout and Viehbacher went through a grueling selection process for more than a year, involving interviews, assessments from within and outside the company, and completion of a special task. Stout, who runs pharma operations, is formally the executive to whom both Viehbacher and Andrew Witty (in the photo on the left), who won the race and is responsible for Europe, currently report. All three sit on the corporate exec team chaired by Garnier.

By adding Viehbacher marks a slight shift in Glaxo’s corporate governance that could please shareholders, by increasing the proportion of execs to non-executives on the board, from just three of the 14 directors at present. Garnier, Julian Heslop, the cfo, and Moncef Slaoui, the chief scientist, are the only three execs who sit on Glaxo’s board, which has been chaired since the start of 2005 by Christopher Gent, who made the selection of Garnier’s successor one of his top priorities.

Meanwhile, Eddie Gray, currently senior vp and general manager for Glaxo’s UK pharma unit, will succeed Witty as head of European pharma as of Jan. 1. Here is the Glaxo statement.