Today, Lonza is a global leader in life sciences operating across three continents. While we work in science, there’s no magic formula to how we do it. Our greatest scientific solution is talented people working together, devising ideas that help businesses to help people. In exchange, we let our people own their careers. Their ideas, big and small, genuinely improve the world. And that’s the kind of work we want to be part of.
As Director / Senior Director, Strategic CAPEX & Investment Portfolio Management, you will shape investment decisions across Lonza’s Specialized Modalities platform. You will lead investment governance, capital planning and portfolio prioritization, helping translate business needs into strategically aligned, financially robust investment proposals.
Working closely with sites, Operations, Commercial Development, Engineering, Finance and Global Value Assurance, you will guide investments from initial opportunity assessment through approval and mobilization. You will also maintain portfolio-level oversight through delivery and value realization, ensuring insights inform future capital allocation decisions.
The role is to be based in one of the locations: Basel or Visp in Switzerland, Houston or Portsmouth in the US
Key responsibilities:
- Lead governance of the Specialized Modalities CAPEX portfolio, including growth investments and major projects requiring Executive Committee approval.
- Drive annual and long-range CAPEX planning, consolidating investment demand across sites and modalities into a transparent, prioritized investment pipeline.
- Develop capital allocation recommendations for senior leadership, balancing strategic priorities, expected value, risk, affordability, capacity requirements and portfolio interdependencies.
- Lead the platform investment governance process from intake through approval, coordinating stage-gate reviews and ensuring proposals are complete and ready for decision.
- Integrate commercial, operational, engineering, financial, people and risk inputs into coherent business cases, constructively challenging assumptions with the responsible functions.
- Partner with Finance and Global Value Assurance on financial evaluation and scenario analysis, ensuring consistency and comparability across investment proposals.
- Support sites during early investment development, translating business needs into clear requirements, viable options and approval-ready proposals.
- Ensure continuity across the end-to-end investment lifecycle, establishing clear accountabilities and coordinating structured handovers to E2E Leads and execution teams.
- Monitor portfolio performance against approved business cases, supporting value reviews and escalating material deviations, risks and decisions requiring leadership attention.
- Strengthen portfolio management through standardized tools, data-driven analytics, cross-project learning and continuous improvement of portfolio reporting, forecasting and decision support. Familiarity with AI-enabled approaches is an advantage.
Key requirements:
- Relevant academic background in engineering, finance, business administration, life sciences or a related discipline.
- Experience in investment portfolio management, strategic CAPEX planning, investment governance or capital project strategy within biopharmaceutical manufacturing, or relevant experience from a leading strategy consulting firm advising clients on capital strategy, manufacturing networks, operations or major investments.
- Strong understanding of biopharmaceutical manufacturing and capital investments, with the ability to evaluate technical feasibility, business cases, financial returns and execution considerations. Direct engineering experience is an advantage.
- Demonstrated ability to lead complex investment initiatives through structured governance and approval processes, coordinating cross-functional stakeholders and ensuring high-quality, decision-ready proposals.
- Ability to integrate cross-functional inputs, challenge assumptions constructively and translate complex information into clear executive recommendations.
- Experience working across sites and functions, influencing senior stakeholders and driving alignment within a matrix organization.
- Strong analytical and communication skills, with a structured approach to managing risks, dependencies and competing investment priorities.
- Experience applying digital tools to portfolio reporting, scenario analysis or decision support. Familiarity with AI-enabled approaches is an advantage.
Every day, Lonza’s products and services have a positive impact on millions of people. For us, this is not only a great privilege, but also a great responsibility. How we achieve our business results is just as important as the achievements themselves. At Lonza, we respect and protect our people and our environment. Any success we achieve is no success at all if not achieved ethically.
People come to Lonza for the challenge and creativity of solving complex problems and developing new ideas in life sciences. In return, we offer the satisfaction that comes with improving lives all around the world. The satisfaction that comes with making a meaningful difference.
