Vatsala Sadasivan

Head of Operational Excellence R&D, North America Sanofi

Vatsala is an operational excellence leader with business, technical and organizational skills focusing in the biopharmaceutical industry, with 14+ years of experience. She has experience working in a number of areas from R&D to clinical and commercial manufacturing operations, with experience in process and analytical science, technology development, manufacturing and quality control operations and quality systems. She is a continuous improvement expert with skills both in strategy and operations management and has experience working in the US, Europe and Asia.

Vatsala is currently the Operational Excellence Lead for Sanofi’s R&D North America Hub, where she is responsible for managing all Operational Excellence activities in the North America region. Prior to the current role, she held various Operational Excellence roles within Sanofi Genzyme in the Commercial Manufacturing Operations business. Before joining Sanofi Genzyme, Vatsala worked for Shire, Millipore and Pfizer in various functions from R&D to clinical and commercial manufacturing operations. She received her MS in Chemical Engineering from Northeastern University-Boston and B. Sc (honors) in Chemical Engineering from University of Nebraska-Lincoln. She is a certified Lean Six Sigma/continuous improvement expert. 

Agenda Day 1

12:00 PM Case Study – The Road to Operational Excellence in R&D

  • Biopharmaceutical R&D Process
  • Challenges in Applying Operational Excellence in R&D
  • How to develop an Operational Excellence roadmap in R&D
  • Example of case studies