Senior Business Controller - Procurement Optimisation

Eurofins Scientific is an international life sciences company, providing a unique range of analytical testing services to clients across multiple industries, to make life and our environment safer, healthier and more sustainable. From the food you eat, to the water you drink, to the medicines you rely on, Eurofins laboratories work with the biggest companies in the world to ensure the products they supply are safe, their ingredients are authentic, and labelling is accurate.

Eurofins is dedicated to delivering testing services that contribute to the health and safety of society and the planet, and to its corporate responsibility to protect the environment and ensure diversity, equity, and inclusion across the entire network of Eurofins companies.

The Senior Business Controller - Procurement Optimisation will lead comprehensive benchmarking initiatives across Eurofins' clinical operations in Europe, with occasional scope extending internationally if required by the business. This role involves driving cross-country benchmarking exercises, ensuring accurate and harmonized data collection, and analyzing total cost of ownership (TCO) to identify pricing disparities and cost-saving opportunities.

Working closely with country lab representatives and experts, business leaders, and category managers, the specialist will will assess consumables pricing and other costs while considering broader factors such as service levels, quality, lead times, supplier performance, and labour costs. Findings will translate into clear, actionable recommendations that support strategic decision-making and subsequent sourcing initiatives.

The successful candidate will combine strong analytical capabilities with exceptional stakeholder management skills within a project management framework, driving the collection of results by ensuring timely data gathering, alignment, and execution of benchmarking initiatives across countries and business units. The role requires in-person presence at the Brussels office, with potential travel to address more complex issues when needed.

Key Responsibilities

1. Benchmarking and Data Collection

• Lead 2-3 benchmarking projects simultaneously, balancing workload based on project complexity.
• Engage directly with country business lines, laboratories, biologists, and subject matter experts to gather clinical sourcing data and test information from local systems.
• Ensure speedy data collection across countries while guaranteeing the information is harmonized, accurate, and complete.
• Evaluate pricing by category and sub-category, considering total cost of ownership, including labour impact and regulatory specifics.

2. Analysis and Insight Generation

• Analyze benchmarking data efficiently, identifying key insights and opportunities for cost optimization.
• Apply judgment to prioritize significant cost drivers while deprioritizing non-material costs.
• Conduct TCO assessments, including comments from stakeholders regarding broader factors such as service levels, quality, lead times, and supplier performance.
• Present findings in a clear, concise, and actionable format for stakeholders.

3. Stakeholder Engagement and Project Management

• Act as the project manager for benchmarking initiatives, ensuring timely progress and stakeholder alignment.
• Organize and lead meetings with country business lines, providing clear context and expectations.
• Follow up persistently to "chase" missing data and ensure project completion.
• Prepare materials and insights for senior steering committees (steercos), including the Regional Business Line CFO, Clinical Business Leaders, and the Head of Global Purchasing.

4. Strategic Recommendations and Follow-Up

• Collaborate with category managers and business leaders to develop recommendations based on benchmarking findings.
• Support the creation of timelines for follow-up projects to capture identified value.
• Ensure insights are integrated into sourcing strategies and category plans.
• Stay informed of ongoing RFPs to incorporate fresh benchmarking data into decision-making.

Core Skills:

• Strong analytical skills, with advanced proficiency in Excel.
• Excellent problem-solving abilities and the capacity to simplify complex matters and provide options to various challenges (by country cost of operating, subject to various regulatory, etc ... ).
• Effective stakeholder management and interpersonal skills, with a strong emphasis on teamwork and collaboration.
• Ability to balance numbers with people, navigate resistance to desired change and calibrate time contingencies.
• Ability to collect, structure, and analyze data while ensuring accuracy and harmonization.
• Clear and concise communication, with the ability to present findings to senior leadership.
• Sense of urgency, get things done on time.

Preferred Tools and Systems:

• Experience with Power BI and Coupa is a plus.
• Familiarity with LIMS systems is beneficial but not required.

Education and Experience:

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Engineering, Finance, Business, or a related field.
• 5–7 years of experience in purchasing, sourcing, supply chain management, or financial analysis/benchmarking.
• Demonstrated success in leading cross-functional projects and benchmarking initiatives.
• Experience working across multiple countries and stakeholder groups.
• Language : English (must have), and second language of the following: French, German and Spanish.

We support your development! Do you feel you don’t match 100% of the requirements? Don’t hesitate to apply anyway! Eurofins companies are committed to supporting your career development.

We embrace diversity! Eurofins network of companies believe in strength and innovation through diversity, being an Equal Opportunity Employer. We prohibit discrimination against employees or applications based on gender identity and/or expression, race, nationality, age, religion, sexual orientation, disability, and everything else that makes employees of Eurofins companies unique.

Sustainability matters to us!  We are well on our way to achieving our objective of carbon neutrality by 2025, through a combination of emission reduction and compensation initiatives. We encourage our laboratory leaders to make sustainable changes at their local level, and in addition to their initiatives we also count on our dedicated carbon reduction team to help us to achieve this goal!

Find out more in our career page: https://careers.eurofins.com/

Company description: Eurofins Scientific is an international life sciences company, providing a unique range of analytical testing services to clients across multiple industries, to make life and our environment safer, healthier and more sustainable. From the food you eat, to the water you drink, to the medicines you rely on, Eurofins laboratories work with the biggest companies in the world to ensure the products they supply are safe, their ingredients are authentic and labelling is accurate.

The Eurofins network of companies is the global leader in food, environment, pharmaceutical and cosmetic product testing and in discovery pharmacology, forensics, advanced material sciences and agroscience contract research services. It is one of the market leaders in certain testing and laboratory services for genomics, discovery pharmacology, forensics, advanced material sciences and in the support of clinical studies, as well as having an emerging global presence in Contract Development and Manufacturing Organisations. It also has a rapidly developing presence in highly specialised and molecular clinical diagnostic testing and in-vitro diagnostic products.

In over 35 years, Eurofins has grown from one laboratory in Nantes, France to 63,000 staff across a decentralised and entrepreneurial network of ca. 950 laboratories in 60 countries. Eurofins companies offer a portfolio of over 200,000 analytical methods to evaluate the safety, identity, composition, authenticity, origin, traceability and purity of biological substances and products.

In 2022, Eurofins generated total revenues of EUR 6.7 billion, and has been among the best performing stocks in Europe over the past 20 years.