MERA Tender and Contracting Lead

Location: MERA (outside UAE & Saudi) /Spain /Turkey

JOB SUMMARY

The majority of Pfizer’s business in the MERA region is driven by institutional clients, who primarily procure medicines through structured tendering processes across various therapeutic categories.

The primary purpose of this role is to:

• Maximize Pfizer’s tender business in the region by coordinating across countries and functions.
• Improve tender readiness and increase win/loss ratio across the portfolio and geographies, in a cross functional setting and alignment – ultimately driving revenue growth through effective tender and contracting leadership.
• Ensuring tender and contracting excellence with a particular emphasis on pricing and competitive insights and market entry strategies.
• Advancing Tender and Contracting Excellence within MERA while adopting the initiatives of ICO’s Centre of Excellence (CoE).
• Be a change agent to transform a price driven to a value driven tendering and sustainable partnerships between Pfizer and tender bodies.

Key Areas Of Responsibility:

Strategic Tender Management – Improved planning, processes, forecasting, tender lifecycle, competitive insights, pricing, supply, white space:

• Drive proactive planning and execution of tender and contracting activities across MERA geographies, ensuring alignment with cross-functional stakeholders and business priorities.
• Develop efficient information management systems to enable forward-looking visibility into key tenders across the region, including tracking performance and reporting outcomes.
• Perform in-depth and predictive analysis of tenders to segment bidding strategies. Identify high-impact tenders in operating plans, define Must-Win Tenders (MWTs), assess risks, and support the development of strategic bidding plans.
• Analyze other bidders’ strategies and provide proactive support to country teams to enhance the competitiveness and effectiveness of tender submissions.
• Create and maintain a centralized competitive insight cockpit to support regional and country leadership with real-time data and strategic insights.
• Evaluate and prioritize tenders and supply needs across countries, ensuring adherence to global pricing guidelines and supporting consistent product availability.
• Provide regional stakeholders with actionable insights into the key tenders to maintain supply continuity and optimize cost of goods sold (CoGS) through volume efficiencies.
• Identification of White Space - Develop strategies to win previously lost tenders, uncover untapped opportunities, and optimize the portfolio to grow underutilized brands and SKUs.
• Maximize top-line revenue and improve margins in the tender business by identifying growth drivers and delivering strategic recommendations to Country Presidents and Managers.
• Oversee the end-to-end tender management lifecycle, ensuring strategic alignment, operational excellence, and continuous improvement.
• Advance and manage a comprehensive regional database encompassing tender calendars, must-win tenders (MWTs), risk and opportunity assessments, and required support actions to capitalize on strategic opportunities and mitigate risks.
• Support the development and implementation of forward-thinking tender strategies aimed at accelerating product access across tender channels, including exploring value-based agreements in alignment with regional and global stakeholders.

Operational Excellence – Support to countries to ensure high-quality tender submissions and increasing winning rates:

• Drive proactive readiness for key tenders through early planning and preparation ahead of tender openings, particularly on GTCs, to ensure timely and high-quality submissions.
• Guide and support the development of tender pricing strategies and bidding approaches, ensuring full compliance with global pricing guidance and alignment with regional objectives.
• Provide direct support for the submission of must-win tenders, coordinating closely with regional and affiliate teams to ensure strategic alignment and execution excellence.
• Offer expert guidance and analytical support throughout the tender lifecycle—from documentation preparation to contract award—ensuring consistency, compliance, and competitiveness.

Foundation Strengthening – Advance the Tender and Contracting Excellence:

• Build and maintain strong internal partnerships with key stakeholders across Global, Regional, and Local teams—including GAV, NIP, PGS, ICO, Country Managers/Presidents, Legal, Compliance, Medical, and local tender teams—to collaboratively address tender and contracting challenges and ensure seamless execution.
• Partner with regional stakeholders to co-lead global initiatives focused on allocation optimization and enterprise margin acceleration, ensuring alignment with broader organizational goals and driving sustainable business impact across MERA.
• Identify and manage risks associated with tender and contracting activities, integrating risk assessments into business reviews. Support the pilot of new concepts and approaches to enhance competitiveness and operational resilience.
• Align projects objectives and activities with regional partners to ensure seamless integration with broader initiatives, maximizing impact and resource utilization.
• Provide strategic input into the annual planning process by coordinating with regional and global stakeholders to manage tender-related analysis, reporting, and target setting for budget development and review.

Tender Shaping & Bid Differentiation

• Drive consistency in value proposition, differentiation, pricing, and commercial conditions across countries and tender opportunities to reinforce strategic positioning and brand equity.
• Analyze customer requirements and dissect bid specifications to support the design of tailored solutions, including strategic wording, documentation, and presentation materials.
• Lead early planning and strategic shaping of key tenders by coordinating cross-functional input—including Public Affairs, Policy, and Medical—to ensure differentiated, competitive, and locally relevant bid positioning.
• Advocate the development of localized Bid Value Matrices and communication plans, as permissible, for priority tenders, ensuring alignment with affiliate teams and responsiveness to market-specific dynamics.
• Advocate the identification of key institutional customers and stakeholders and support the development of comprehensive stakeholder mapping and engagement strategies to appropriately position our innovations.

Capability Building & Continuous Improvement

• Identify and address technology and capability gaps by integrating global Tender & Contracting platforms and tools to enhance operational efficiency and data-driven decision-making.
• Design and implement robust dashboards and KPIs to monitor and assess tender and contracting operations across the region, enabling data-driven decision-making and continuous improvement.
• In collaboration with ICO Tender & Contracting, lead high-impact training programs for regional and local teams. Establish and support a network of tender champions across countries to foster best practices and elevate tendering capabilities.

QUALIFICATIONS:

• Bachelor’s degree in pharmacy, Business Administration, Marketing, Economics, or a related discipline. Master’s degree is a plus.
• At least 15 years of progressive experience in the pharmaceutical industry, with a minimum of 10 years of managerial roles overseeing public channel including tendering, sales, marketing, market access, pricing, category leadership or other relevant roles.
• Deep understanding of public tendering frameworks, contracting mechanisms, financing models, and regulatory environments of different markets, preferably within MERA.
• Proven experience in developing and executing commercial and access strategies across multiple markets and different Therapy Areas.
• Diverse leadership experiences of cross-functional collaboration, coaching and team oversight to drive impactful business outcomes.
• Strong organizational skills with the ability to prioritize competing demands and managing complex projects in a matrixed organization.
• Champion innovation by proactively challenging the status quo and fostering an entrepreneurial mindset
• Translate strategic objectives into actionable plans with a strong focus on quality, performance, and results
• Build and maintain strong relationships through exceptional interpersonal, communication, and stakeholder engagement skills across diverse geographies and functions.

This is a GJL100 role.

Sales Operations & Admin