How are bio/pharma companies and their suppliers tackling difficult challenges in development, manufacturing, and the supply chain, including in risk management? How is supplier relationship management evolving? Senior executives at the education programs at DCAT Week will provide key insights.

Innovation at work
Innovation is essential for achieving operational excellence and delivering value. To gain insight on best practices and  lessons learned, a DCAT Week 2025 program, Partnering for Innovation in Manufacturing & Supply, will feature three case examples on how bio/pharma companies and their partners collaborated to resolve difficult challenges that arose in development, manufacturing, or the supply chain. The case examples and speakers are;

Optimized a filling process and related device design for a challenging drug product:

• Fernando Otero, Associate Vice President, External Manufacturing, MSD International Business GmbH
• Maria Elena Guadagno, Technical Operations & Business Executive Director, BSP Pharmaceuticals

Developed a global supply chain solution in managing clinical trial material supply for a late-stage drug candidate:.

• Sheng Cui, Ph.D., Chief Manufacturing Officer, NewAmsterdam Pharma
• Luke Wilson, Senior Director of Commercial Operations, Biotech, Thermo Fisher Scientific

Resolved cost, regulatory, and operational challenges in sourcing a critical and difficult-to-source raw material:

• Matt Schnecke, Senior Leader of Supply Chain & Operations, Aquestive Therapeutics
• Jamie Shah, President, Chem Impex

The program, which is exclusive to DCAT Member Companies, will be held on Tuesday March 18, 2025, 8:00 to 9:30 AM. Further information, including how to register, may be found here.

Building resilient supply chains
Employing effective strategies to assess and mitigate risk is crucial to building resiliency in supply chains. In an ever-changing global landscape, this becomes even more challenging where geopolitical and other unforeseen events come into play.

The DCAT Week program, Achieving Supply Chain Resiliency Amid Geopolitical Risk, will provide insights from an executive panel—from within and outside the industry—on best practices and lessons learned on how to prepare, monitor, and respond to potential or actual disruptions due to geopolitical events and other macro environmental factors. The panel discussion will feature: Lisa Martin, Senior Vice President and Chief Procurement Officer, GSK; Sally Macaluso, Chief Procurement Officer, GE HealthCare; Alejandro Fernandez, Director, Product Planning & Fulfillment, Cisco; Carla La Montagna, Senior Sourcing Director, Biologics and Packaging, Johnson & Johnson; and moderator: Derron Stark, EY-Parthenon Partner, Strategy & Transactions – Life Sciences, Supply Chain, Ernst & Young LLP.

The program will examine several key questions:

 • What risks arise from geopolitical factors, and how can such risks can be monitored?

 • What risk-mitigation practices should be in place?

 • How should customers and suppliers plan for response?

 • When is joint scenario planning appropriate?

 • How can joint implementation of risk mitigation be best executed?

The program, which is exclusive to DCAT Member Companies, will be held Tuesday March 18, 2025, 11:00 AM–12:00 PM. Further information, including how to register, may be found here.

Measuring pharma customer–supplier performance
Strong and mutually beneficial customer–supplier relations are always of importance, but they have taken on even greater significance as companies navigate unique challenges to assure supply of critical materials and services in a fast-changing global environment. While these developments have not changed the traditional customer–supplier relationship, they are making bio/pharma companies more aware of how their supplier relationships can impact their ability to deliver value to key stakeholders: patients and investors.

Metrics to evaluate supplier performance are common, but how about measuring the performance of customers? Do pharmaceutical companies seek the input from their suppliers on how they are performing as a customer, and in turn, how do suppliers evaluate the performance of their customers? And more importantly, are pharma companies and suppliers aligned in what constitutes a “customers of choice” or “preferred customers” of their suppliers?

The DCAT Week program, What Makes a Customer of Choice: Are Pharma Companies & Suppliers Aligned?, answers those questions by examining the efforts companies are making to becoming preferred customers of their suppliers, how suppliers are designating those “customers of choice,” and what benefits customers and suppliers receive from such efforts.

An executive panel will provide a “buy-and-sell-side view” on this very important issue. The executive panel will feature:  Vince Ricevuto, Vice President of Research & Development, Capital, Logistics, and Energy Procurement, GSK; Aatosh Chauhan, Executive Director, Strategy & Operations, Small Molecule External Manufacturing, Merck & Co. Inc.; Subramanya Nayak, Ph.D, Director, CMC Supply Chain and Program Strategy, AbbVie; Carla Vozone, PharmD, Vice President, Specialty Drug Delivery, Catalent Pharma Solutions; and Rina Chokshi, Ph.D., Global Commercial Marketing Director, Pharma Solutions, IFF.

The program, which is exclusive to DCAT Member Companies, will be held Wednesday March 19, 2025, 10:00–11:00 AM. Further information, including how to register, may be found here.