Texas Medical Center Names McKeon as New CEO to Replace Robbins

Houston—The Texas Medical Center announced Thursday that Bill McKeon will become its president and CEO, replacing Bobby Robbins.

McKeon had been the TMC’s executive vice president and chief strategy and operating officer under Robbins, who last month was named the president of the University of Arizona.

“Bill McKeon is a seasoned executive who has served as a central figure in rapidly transforming the Texas Medical Center over the last few years,” said O. Holcombe Crosswell, chairman of TMC’s board of directors, in a press statement. “He has been the architect and lead in executing the initial stages of our strategic plan, including the TMC Innovation Institute and the TMC3 translational research campus.”

McKeon said in the statement that he believed the TMC was in the midst of its “most transformational period” and plans to pursue opportunities to make Houston a “third coast” in life science innovation. Prior to joining TMC in 2013, McKeon held positions in companies and institutions such as DuPont, Stanford University Medical Center, US Oncology, and Medtronic.

Shawn Cloonan, who came to TMC in 2013 as general counsel and executive vice president, was named chief operating officer. TMC said Cloonan will continue to oversee legal affairs at the institution.

Author: Angela Shah

Angela Shah was formerly the editor of Xconomy Texas. She has written about startups along a wide entrepreneurial spectrum, from Silicon Valley transplants to Austin transforming a once-sleepy university town in the '90s tech boom to 20-something women defying cultural norms as they seek to build vital IT infrastructure in a war-torn Afghanistan. As a foreign correspondent based in Dubai, her work appeared in The New York Times, TIME, Newsweek/Daily Beast and Forbes Asia. Before moving overseas, Shah was a staff writer and columnist with The Dallas Morning News and the Austin American-Statesman. She has a Bachelor's of Journalism from the University of Texas at Austin, and she is a 2007 Knight-Wallace Fellow at the University of Michigan. With the launch of Xconomy Texas, she's returned to her hometown of Houston.