Stefan Brazda has been Manager Operational Excellence at Takeda since 2019, being responsible for processes and strategy. Prior to this, for more than 10 years, he worked as portfolio manager and lean specialist, among others, at Burgwedel Biotech and MSD.

Luc Scheffer is a Director responsible for OT/IT and Digital for one of the biggest Biotech Manufacturing site of Merck Group. He joined the Healthcare industry in 2021. Before that he worked for 15 years in the Aerospace Industry in various Manufacturing Executive roles. His mandate was always to drive Manufacturing efficiency so he naturally moved towards Digital Manufacturing and drove a major Smart Manufacturing Programme for Rolls-Royce in Asia. His aim is now to leverage this experience to accelerate Merck's Digital Manufacturing ambition. Since he joined Merck he reorganized the Data and Digital Group and launched a redesign initiative of the MES solution to ensure the foundations are robust before building the solution that will push Merck towards Industry 4.0.

The Pop in Your Job
Since he joined the Healthcare Industry, Luc has been amazed by the improvement potential that Digital could bring. The learnings from other industries are totally applicable and would yield sizable benefits if properly applied.

Markus Ristl is IT System Owner MES (PAS-X 3.2.x) and IT Business Partner at Takeda. He has more than 20 years of IT experience, working among others at Shire, Baxalta, and Baxter International.

Dr. Gilad Langer is an accomplished business leader with 28+ years of experience in digital transformation, manufacturing IT, engineering services delivery, and technical operations. He has deep domain expertise in Digital Technologies and Manufacturing Business Systems (IIoT, Big Data, AI, MES, MI, PLM, QMS, DCS, & SCADA). He has an accomplished track record of Digital Transformation to drive high levels of operational performance in manufacturing industries with a specific focus in the regulated Life Sciences industries (pharma, biotech, & med device). He has also served as trusted adviser and business consultant in the areas of technology directions, industry strategy, and software implementations. His focus and passion is next generation (Pharma 4.0) digital technologies and IIoT for manufacturing. Dr. Langer started his career in academia, researching concepts and architectures for agile manufacturing systems using novel concepts that were the archetype for Industry 4.0 and Industrial IoT. He takes a systematic and strategic approach that he has honed throughout his career in different roles including consulting, sales, marketing, product strategy, project management, software development and implementation, and research.

Creating better health for people and a brighter future for the world is our purpose. The science and technology we advance are constantly evolving. But through our enduring values, our ambition remains steadfast. We strive to deliver truly transformative treatments, contributing significant value to society while creating an exceptional experience for our people. Our main areas of focus include Gastrointestinal and Inflammation, Rare Diseases, Plasma-Derived Therapies, Oncology, Neuroscience, and Vaccines.

Our passion for science and technology is what drives our more than 64,000 employees across 66 countries to find solutions to some of today’s toughest challenges and create more sustainable ways to live. We are here for people at every step, helping create, improve and prolong life. We deliver personalized treatments for serious diseases and enable people to achieve their dream of becoming parents. We empower the scientific community. Our tools, services, and digital platform make research simpler, more exact, and help to deliver breakthroughs more quickly. We provide progressive treatment solutions that help improve access to health thanks to the accuracy of our tests and the reliability of our medicine. As a company, we are at the forefront of digital living. Our science sits inside technologies that change the way we access, store, process, and display information. Our innovative technology drives human progress and opens new possibilities to transform life on Earth as we know it. Thanks to the constant curiosity of our employees, we are making discoveries that can change the landscape of entire industries. For more than 350 years, we’ve been pushing the boundaries of what’s possible, and we’ll continue to do so in the years to come.

Creating better health for people and a brighter future for the world is our purpose. The science and technology we advance are constantly evolving. But through our enduring values, our ambition remains steadfast. We strive to deliver truly transformative treatments, contributing significant value to society while creating an exceptional experience for our people. Our main areas of focus include Gastrointestinal and Inflammation, Rare Diseases, Plasma-Derived Therapies, Oncology, Neuroscience, and Vaccines.

Tulip, the leader in frontline operations, is empowering the world’s leading companies to improve the productivity of their teams, the quality of their output, and the efficiency of their operations. Companies use Tulip to digitally transform their operations and gain real-time visibility into the people, machines and processes involved in production—all in a matter of days. Companies of all sizes, across industries including consumer electronics, pharmaceuticals, aerospace and defense, contract manufacturing, automotive, apparel, medical devices and more, have implemented Tulip’s intuitive software and hardware platform to solve some of the most pressing challenges in frontline operations. Companies use Tulip to error-proof processes with guided workflows, integrate industrial IoT (IIoT) technologies with legacy machines, and capture and analyze real-time operations data.