Category Manager - Commercial & Market Services (Generics Pharma)

As Category Manager for Commercial & Market Services, you define and evolve global category strategies for communications, market research, and sales services within a regulated, cost-conscious pharmaceutical business. You partner with Commercial, Marketing, Market Access, and Finance to enable compliant, scalable sourcing and innovation-led value creation. You translate strategy into actionable roadmaps, drive supplier relationships, and ensure governance and transparency across regions. This role offers impact by shaping how we source critical services at scale.

• Develop and execute global, multi-year category strategies for commercial & market services aligned with objectives, cost competitiveness, and regulatory requirements
• Translate strategies into sourcing roadmaps supporting speed to market, launch excellence, and ethical promotion standards
• Drive value beyond savings through innovation, standardisation, and scalable sourcing models across regions
• Monitor market dynamics (media inflation, agency consolidation, data providers, digital transformation) and integrate insights into sourcing decisions
• Lead end-to-end category management including spend analysis, demand challenge, contract negotiation, and framework agreements
• Design and deploy preferred supplier models, rate cards, and global/local playbooks
• Ensure robust contracting covering IP ownership, data privacy (GDPR), promotional compliance, and performance-based mechanisms
• Ensure execution of category strategies by countries, improving procurement maturity, governance, and standardisation
• Build and manage structured supplier relationships, define and monitor KPIs and governance models
• Drive continuous improvement, innovation pilots, and joint business reviews with strategic suppliers
• Collaborate with Global/Local Marketing, Sales, Market Access, Finance, Legal, and Compliance on launches and market entries with agile sourcing
• Play a key role in annual budget cycle and Long‑Range Plan (LRP), ensuring governance, spend visibility, and variance analysis
• Support savings delivery, cost evolution modelling, and financial transparency with Finance and Procurement CoE
• Ensure compliance with internal procurement policies, ethical promotion standards, and pharmaceutical regulations
• Manage supplier risks related to dependency, data confidentiality, and regulatory exposure; maintain audit-ready sourcing documentation

• Master’s degree in Procurement, Business, Marketing, or a related field
• 8–12 years of experience in procurement or category management with exposure to commercial, marketing, or sales-related categories
• Strong expertise in category strategy, supplier relationship management, and navigating complex stakeholder environments
• Proven negotiation and value-creation track record
• High financial acumen including budgets, LRP, TCO, and ROI
• Fluent in English; additional European languages are an advantage
• Strong stakeholder-management skills with ability to influence and challenge senior stakeholders constructively

• stakeholder management
• influence without authority
• communication
• category strategy
• supplier relationship management (SRM)
• contract negotiation