Director / Senior Director, Strategic CAPEX & Investment Portfolio Management

Lonza•Portsmouth, NH

About The Position

As Director / Senior Director, Strategic CAPEX & Investment Portfolio Management, you will shape investment decisions across Lonza’s Specialized Modalities platform. You will lead investment governance, capital planning and portfolio prioritization, translating business needs into strategically aligned, financially robust investment proposals. Working closely with sites, Operations, Commercial Development, Engineering, Finance and Global Value Assurance, you will guide investments from initial opportunity assessment through approval and mobilization. You will maintain portfolio-level oversight through delivery and value realization, ensuring insights inform future capital allocation decisions. The role is based in Basel or Visp, Switzerland, or Houston or Portsmouth, US.

Requirements

Relevant academic background in engineering, finance, business administration, life sciences or a related discipline.
Experience in investment portfolio management, strategic CAPEX planning, investment governance or capital project strategy within biopharmaceutical manufacturing, or relevant experience from a leading strategy consulting firm advising clients on capital strategy, manufacturing networks, operations or major investments.
Strong understanding of biopharmaceutical manufacturing and capital investments, with the ability to evaluate technical feasibility, business cases, financial returns and execution considerations.
Demonstrated ability to lead complex investment initiatives through structured governance and approval processes, coordinating cross-functional stakeholders and ensuring high-quality, decision-ready proposals.
Ability to integrate cross-functional inputs, challenge assumptions constructively and translate complex information into clear executive recommendations.
Experience working across sites and functions, influencing senior stakeholders and driving alignment within a matrix organization.
Strong analytical and communication skills, with a structured approach to managing risks, dependencies and competing investment priorities.
Experience applying digital tools to portfolio reporting, scenario analysis or decision support.

Nice To Haves

Direct engineering experience.
Familiarity with AI-enabled approaches to portfolio management, reporting, forecasting or decision support.

Responsibilities

Lead governance of the Specialized Modalities CAPEX portfolio, including growth investments and major projects requiring Executive Committee approval.
Drive annual and long-range CAPEX planning, consolidating investment demand across sites and modalities into a transparent, prioritized investment pipeline.
Develop capital allocation recommendations for senior leadership, balancing strategic priorities, expected value, risk, affordability, capacity requirements and portfolio interdependencies.
Lead the platform investment governance process from intake through approval, coordinating stage-gate reviews and ensuring proposals are complete and ready for decision.
Integrate commercial, operational, engineering, financial, people and risk inputs into coherent business cases, constructively challenging assumptions with the responsible functions.
Partner with Finance and Global Value Assurance on financial evaluation and scenario analysis, ensuring consistency and comparability across investment proposals.
Support sites during early investment development, translating business needs into clear requirements, viable options and approval-ready proposals.
Ensure continuity across the end-to-end investment lifecycle, establishing clear accountabilities and coordinating structured handovers to E2E Leads and execution teams.
Monitor portfolio performance against approved business cases, supporting value reviews and escalating material deviations, risks and decisions requiring leadership attention.
Strengthen portfolio management through standardized tools, data-driven analytics, cross-project learning and continuous improvement of portfolio reporting, forecasting and decision support.