Rudi Thiel is currently Head of Quality Systems & Compliance and Senior Manager Quality Assurance at Biogen. On the latest steps in his career, he was leading the Operational Technology Operating Model – Program for Novartis Technical Operations. This program included all activities required in both IT and OT space in order to address the progressing IT / OT convergence for all manufacturing sites.

From 2012 – 2017 Rudi Thiel was the IT Project Lead for New Launch Facility (NSLF) at Novartis. He was responsible for all IT components for the new launch facility for solid forms in PharmOps Switzerland including Manufacturing Execution System (MES) as well as IT Infrastructure.
From 2009 until 2012, Rudi was Head of Risk, Compliance & Quality for Global TechOps IT at Novartis, being accountable for all activities related to risk, compliance & quality in Global TechOps IT, including functional reports in all TechOps sites. Before that, Rudi was Quality Manager Global TechOps IT and prior to that, held the position of Program Quality Manager, Pharma ERP Program (PEP) Program Manager for SAP implementation, all for Novartis and Novartis US.

During his professional career, among others, Rudi Thiel also worked Roche Pharma as Quality Manager for Global SAP Competence Center, for CSC Ploenzke Switzerland as Project & Quality Manager and he was IT Consultant for various projects in the pharmaceutical industry.

Shannon Ostendorff leads the Lonza Asset Management Program as Head of Global Maintenance Excellence at Lonza. Based out of Bend, Oregon (USA), she leads an integrated global program which realizes value from assets by optimizing maintenance and calibration processes , reducing downtime to maximize utilization and optimizing lifecycle cost of assets. Shannon has over 20 years of experience leading teams to deliver asset management programs in the pharmaceutical, semiconductor and clean water industries. She has a chemical engineering background and enjoys spending her times in the mountains skiing, hiking, camping and biking with her husband and four children.

Design for Reliability
Supporting & consulting the project team & plant engineering team of a new state-of-the-art solids production facility with regards to reliability aspects & with a strong focus on condition monitoring & predictive maintenance topics.
My main tasks include the identification & application of appropriate & proven condition monitoring techniques (vibration monitoring, process & package unit monitoring) on a variety of machines in the GMP environment and the collaboration with OEMs (research & development).

Condition Monitoring & Predictive Maintenance
Supporting & Consulting all divisions, sites & plants with regards to condition monitoring & predictive maintenance topics. Co-founder of an internal global vibration monitoring service, which enables a cheap, fast & easy installation (plug & play) of wireless vibration sensors to monitor the health for a variety of rotating machine types. The service is built on top of a well-developed IT infrastructure (together with the hardware/software supplier & external IT service supplier) & enables a flexible monitoring concept (monitoring performed by a local, global and/or external vibration analyst).

Data Analytics in Manufacturing
Performing data analytics in manufacturing environment. Includes among others programming (Python), usage of cloud resources (AWS) & application of Continuous Integration/Continuous Delivery (CI/CD) approaches (Visual Studio Code, Github, Terraform) for data engineering.

Director Maintenance, Engineering AstraZeneca Sweden Operations
Joined AstraZeneca in 2019, has former work in different positions at Scania. During 8 years., in beginning 2000, I build a new business area in a daughter company where we offered services for business development with Lean and TPM.
Started as manager 1996 and has worked with different groups and organizations, from senior Lean consultants to >500 people in an automotive industry
Worked as Production manager, Maintenance manager and Lean/TPM consultant in different industries; automotive, mining, powerplants, paper mills.
Co-author of “Availability for maximized productivity ”
I have learned over the years that I need to be a good leader to be able to get the effect in tools and WoW for the people I work with. It starts with us humans.

The Pop in Your Job: What drives you? What is your passion?:
I´m driven by developing people and WoW to be more efficient and productive.
To invest time in people and give them the conditions to make the best result really give me a boost.

Through cutting-edge science and medicine, Biogen discovers, develops and delivers innovative therapies worldwide for people living with serious neurological and neurodegenerative diseases. Founded in 1978, Biogen is a pioneer in biotechnology and today the Company has the leading portfolio of medicines to treat multiple sclerosis, has introduced the first and only approved treatment for spinal muscular atrophy, and is at the forefront of neurology research for conditions including Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. Biogen also manufactures and commercializes biosimilars of advanced biologics. With approximately 7000 people worldwide, we are truly a global organization, headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, which is also home to our research operations. Our international headquarters are based in Zug, Switzerland and we have world-class manufacturing facilities in North Carolina and Denmark. We offer therapies globally through direct affiliate presence in 30 countries and a network of distribution partners in over 50 additional countries.

At Lonza, we enable #AHealthierWorld by supporting our healthcare customers on the path to commercialization. Our community of 16,000 talented employees work across a global network of more than 30 sites to deliver for our customers across the pharma, biotech and nutrition markets. By combining technological insight with world-class manufacturing, scientific expertise and process excellence, we help our customers to deliver new and innovative medicines that help treat a wide range of diseases. 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 commitment and ideas that help our customers 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. Our work makes #AMeaningfulDifference.

Bayer is a global enterprise with core competencies in the life science fields of healthcare and nutrition. We design our products and services to help people and planet thrive by supporting efforts to address the unprecedented global challenges presented by a growing and aging global population. At Bayer, we’re committed to drive sustainable development and generate a positive impact with our businesses. Through bold ideas and unprecedented insights, we’re pioneering new possibilities that advance life for all of us. That means reimagining how we care for ourselves and one another by empowering everyday health, improving approaches to patient care, and finding better ways to nourish our communities around the world.

AstraZeneca is a global, science-led biopharmaceutical company that focuses on the discovery, development and commercialisation of prescription medicines. Our Purpose is to push the boundaries of science to deliver life-changing medicines. We believe the best way we can achieve our Purpose is to put science at the centre of everything we do. Science defines who we are. It is why we come to work every day and is part of our DNA. But this is only half of the story. We know that we do not have all the answers. We want to share ideas because we believe it results in better medicines. We want the way we work to be inclusive, open and collaborative. This approach runs through all that we do. We focus on three main therapy areas – Oncology, Cardiovascular & Metabolic Disease (CVMD) and Respiratory – and we are also selectively active in the areas of autoimmunity, neuroscience and infection. To put ourselves in the best position to push the boundaries of science, we seek to leverage our combination of capabilities, which encompass both small molecules and biologics, and include immunotherapies and developing innovative delivery devices that can offer choice to patients. These are reinforced by a strong focus on personalised healthcare capabilities, which aim to match medicines only to those patients who will benefit from them. Our teams also work alongside the world's leading academic and biotech research institutions to stimulate innovation and evaluate emerging technologies such as Modified RNA and CRISPR genome editing. AstraZeneca operates in over 100 countries and its innovative medicines are used by millions of patients worldwide. For more information, visit www.astrazeneca.com.