From Margin to Mission: Driving Pricing Transformation in Life Sciences

Client Overview

Our client is a globally recognized leader in the manufacturing of specialty measurement systems for pharmaceutical, biomedical, environmental, clinical, food, and chemical applications. For more than 65 years, the company has helped ensure the safety of medications, the purity of food and water, and the sustainability of industrial processes through advanced analytical instrumentation and software. Now, as it shapes a future-focused Life Sciences and Diagnostics division, the client is embarking on a broader enterprise-wide transformation focused on regulated, high-volume testing environments.

The Challenge / Mandate

As part of its broader transformation agenda, the client needed an experienced Interim Pricing Transformation Lead to reimagine and overhaul its global pricing capabilities. While the organization had a long-standing legacy in high-performance measurement technologies, its pricing governance, discounting processes, and internal pricing function design lacked cohesion, consistency, and strategic clarity.

The mandate required a seasoned leader who could act as a thought partner to the Transformation Office and senior leadership while also driving tactical execution. Key priorities included:

• Designing and implementing pricing governance frameworks across regions.
• Establishing consistent global discounting and pricing approval workflows.
• Recommending and helping build a modern pricing function, including role definition, process ownership, and cross-functional accountability.
• Ensuring pricing strategies were aligned with business unit goals, customer value propositions, and regulatory complexity across markets.
• Mobilizing and leading cross-functional teams to align on pricing decisions and facilitate behavioral change across sales, marketing, finance, and operations.

The client lacked deep internal pricing expertise and required a transformational leader who could bridge strategy with execution. The assignment was scoped for 6–9 months with a strong likelihood of converting to a permanent leadership role.

Search Strategy

To meet the mandate, we conducted a focused search for senior pricing professionals with both consulting and operating experience. The ideal candidate would:

• Possess 20+ years of experience in pricing, with a history of leading large-scale pricing transformations across complex manufacturing, life sciences, or industrial organizations.
• Combine deep pricing expertise with strategic acumen and hands-on execution ability.
• Have held prior leadership roles in both consulting and industry, ideally within private equity or enterprise transformation contexts.
• Demonstrate a track record of designing pricing functions from the ground up, deploying pricing systems, and coaching teams through change
• Be a confident communicator and data-driven influencer able to guide senior executives through pricing trade-offs and longer-term value creation.

We prioritized candidates who had built pricing programs and technologies that had material impact on profit margins, customer segmentation, and cross-regional pricing harmonization.

The Placement

We placed a highly accomplished commercial leader and recognized pricing strategist with over 25 years of experience spanning management consulting, SaaS innovation, and industry transformation. She had been repeatedly recognized by peers as a top global pricing consultant, and brought a proprietary methodology and platform that had consistently delivered results across manufacturing, distribution, and life sciences sectors.

Her career highlights included:

• Partnering with a PE-backed distributor to increase prices by 6% within 18 months across hundreds of SKUs.
• Driving a profit turnaround recognized by the Board of a publicly traded infrastructure company.
• Leading pricing strategy through diligence, post-close, and exit for multiple M&A-backed transformations.
• Founding a pricing strategy firm and later launching a complementary SaaS platform to enable scalable, AI-enhanced value-based pricing practices.

Her blend of technical pricing depth, operational leadership, and mission-driven approach made her an ideal fit for the client’s transformation agenda.

The Outcome

Upon engagement, the consultant immediately partnered with the Transformation Office to assess current-state pricing operations and build momentum for change. Within weeks, she had:

• Conducted a maturity assessment of pricing tools, processes, and policies.
• Established a governance framework with clear escalation paths, accountability, and transparency.
• Defined future-state pricing organization structure and role definitions.
• Facilitated executive-level working sessions to align stakeholders on discounting thresholds, deal desk processes, and margin protection strategies.
• Recommended metrics and dashboards to improve pricing visibility across product lines and geographies.

The client was highly impressed with her thought leadership, clarity of communication, and ability to create buy-in across functions. Her work laid the groundwork for long-term pricing excellence and helped position the client for a more agile, value-based commercial model. Due to her strong impact and cultural alignment, she is under consideration for a permanent executive role to continue leading pricing transformation efforts across the broader enterprise.