Fermentation Manager

Fermentation Manager – West Chester, PA

Managing the Fermentation Department which involves overseeing both the Fermentation Team and all aspects of Fermentation and DSP activities, with a focus on ensuring that safety, quality, and industry standards are adhered to. Coordinate with Quality Control, R&D, Production, and Maintenance to ensure smooth operations and alignment with overall company goals. Ensure that all fermentation processes are operating efficiently and consistently while staying informed about new technologies and equipment for fermentation and DSP that can enhance performance, efficiency, and consistency.

Duties and Responsibilities

• Implement guidelines for a structured and consistent approach for safety, quality, and process codification within the Fermentation Department.
• Ensure the management of Fermentation team with relevant communications and interactions with other departments, as well as training of the Fermentation team while providing an appropriate level of motivation and guidance.
• Manage fermentation schedule for internal production and CMO’s.based on bacteria inventory and needs.
• Ensure custom fermentation with a customer centricity approach, respect to budget and reporting of results.
• Impulse process changes and practices to reach the best-in-class level.
• Ensuring proactivity in handling deviations from standard processes and by maintaining a consistent performance in the Fermentation Department. By focusing on troubleshooting, root cause analysis, and implementing corrective actions through a structured action plan and quickly address issues, minimize disruption, and prevent recurrence.
• Prepare and present regular reports on department performance, including KPIs such as yield rates, quality metrics, and cost efficiency. Report any deviations and corrective actions.
• Ensure effectiveness in the Fermentation Department according to specifications and within budget requires a balanced approach that optimizes raw materials, energy usage, equipment, and productivity.
• Responsible for production performance vs standard technical ratio and budget.
• Implementing a Continuous Improvement dynamic in the Fermentation Department using tools like LEAN, Data Mining, and Benchmarking can significantly enhance operational efficiency, reduce waste, and increase productivity.
• Develop departmental CapEx and OpEx budgets with Technical Director.
• Lead process studies and process support for CapEx.
• Take part as key player in Commissioning Workshop investments in collaboration with local and Group Team Project, when applicable.
• Collaborate with Quality Department for inoculum preparation schedule, quality monitoring and troubleshooting.
• Collaborate with R&D to achieve company goals, optimize recipes and process, and launch new products.
• Collaborate with Maintenance team to complete PM schedule, repairs, and upgrades. Join and develop positive contribution in Fermentation Community
• Ensure the proper usage of the ERP by fermentation and DSP team.
• Participate in bi-yearly inventories

Key Factors of Success

• Ability to prioritize, organize and delegate to others while following through to ensure completion.
• Strong level of communication and “customer services” skills/mindset
• Good ability to communicate and interact with others and being a Team Player.
• Good ability for troubleshooting and strong perseverance in actions monitoring.
• Ability to analyze all roots of problematics and issues, considering potential consequences prior to acting.
• Strong presence on the field, with the people and equipment, in order to anticipate the issues.
• Excellent organizational and interpersonal communication skills with proven decision-making ability.

Education: Master’s degree or PhD in biology, microbiology, biochemical or related biological field

Experience:

• 5 -10 years of relevant industry experience in industrial fermentation environment
• Proven track record of effective industrial management
• Fermentation experience with a variety of bacterial organisms
• Experience with upstream and downstream processes including centrifugation and spray drying.