Four new 'customer-centric' business units are called Essentials, Specialties, Biotech, and SAFC
Sigma-Aldrich has announced a new organisation consisting of four customer-centric business units, each headed by a president reporting to the company's president and COO, intended to further enhance its ability to serve its diverse base of more than sixty thousand commercial accounts comprising one million individual customers worldwide and the potential for above market growth rates.
After an extensive six month study which included interviews with nearly 650 customers around the globe, the company is reorganising its two existing life science and high technology research businesses - scientific research and biotechnology - into three units, each with its own distinctive competencies to meet the needs of carefully defined customer segments.
Essentials (20% of the company's current sales), which will offer customised account management to largely economic buyers in pharmaceutical, academic and commercial research organisations, headed by Gilles Cottier, 47, most recently vice president - sales.
Cottier joined Sigma-Aldrich in Lyon, France in 1986 and has served in a number of positions of increasing responsibility including country manager for France and vice president - international sales and operations.
Specialties (35% of the company's current sales), which will offer the company's traditional broad line of specialty products through its website and catalogues to lab scientists in these same accounts worldwide, headed by David Julien, 50, most recently president - biotechnology.
Biotech (20% of the company's current sales), will focus on providing innovative, first-to-market research tools for life scientists, headed by Shaf Yousaf, 45, most recently vice president - corporate R and D and biotechnology marketing.
Yousaf has helped launch many of the company's new initiatives in molecular biology and biotech since bringing 13 years of experience with another leading global biotech company to Sigma-Aldrich in 1996.
The company's final business - SAFC - which stands separate from these research units and represents 25% of the company's current sales after the recent acquisition of JRH Biosciences, offers fine chemical products and flexible service solutions for customers in the three key industrial market segments of pharma, biosciences and hi-tech.
SAFC will continue to be led by Frank Wicks, 52, who has served as the unit's president since January 2003.
Both Cottier and Yousaf will join Julien, Wicks, chairman and CEO David Harvey, 66, president and COO Jai Nagarkatti, 58, and chief administrative officer and CFO Michael Hogan, 52, as members of the company's executive management group.
While these organisational changes are effective immediately, the company plans to continue to report its sales results for its three existing scientific research, biotechnology and SAFC business units through 2005 and begin reporting under the new four-unit structure in 2006.
Further details regarding the company's goals, high-level strategies and growth initiatives for this new organisation will be shared at its annual business review for shareholders and analysts on Tuesday 16 August 2005 at 8:30am (US Central Daylight Time).
Information provided at that session will be simultaneously webcast over the Sigma-Aldrich website.
A replay will be available on the company's website until Tuesday 23 August 2005.
Commenting on the new organisation, president and COO Jai Nagarkatti said: "We're excited about our new organisation and the opportunities its sharpened focus on meeting customers' needs is expected to provide for driving the potential for even better and more profitable growth.
"This latest change in our evolution towards a truly customer-centric company builds on the success of our past initiatives.
"Resting firmly on the base of historically profitable operations and a strong balance sheet, we believe this latest change and the strategies that support it should enable us to simultaneously excel in serving our customers, deliver 10% top and bottom line growth long-term for our shareholders and provide exciting and challenging opportunities for our employees."
