Karen Lynch, a superstar CEO championing the biggest of big ideas, is out.
As chief of corner drugstore and health insurance colossus CVS, Lynch headed the largest Fortune 500 enterprise, measured by sales, of any female CEO, and for years reigned as the most powerful woman in American business. In her first two years after being chosen for the top job in late 2020, Lynch seemed on the road to glory. By late 2022, she’d lifted CVS’s share price from $70 to roughly $110. Investors were buying her daring new strategy: making CVS a one-stop shop for pharmacy services and basic care, right in their own neighborhoods, augmented by hands-on, data-driven management from their in-house insurer that reminded folks to refill prescriptions and get their annual physical.
