Senior Director, Delivery Cell Therapy

At AstraZeneca, we are building the supply capabilities needed to deliver the next generation of cell therapies to patients around the world. As Senior Director, Delivery, you will lead the global enabling team responsible for strengthening and protecting the third-party supplier ecosystem across our Cell Therapy portfolio. You will shape how we anticipate supplier risk, build strategic supplier relationships and secure the direct materials and external capabilities needed to support in-vivo, autologous and allogeneic cell therapies. Your leadership will help move the organization from reactive escalation toward proactive supply assurance, creating resilient, scalable supply networks that can grow from clinical development through commercial delivery. Based in Gaithersburg Maryland, this role reports to the Executive Director, External Supply & Delivery and includes global travel to suppliers as needed. Why This Role Cell therapy supply chains operate with extraordinary complexity. Materials, manufacturing partners, logistics providers and technology platforms must perform reliably against highly regulated requirements and patient-critical timelines. In this role, you will have the opportunity to: • Build the Supplier Relationship Management (SRM) and supplier risk frameworks that shape how Cell Therapy manages its global external ecosystem. • Provide forward-looking visibility of supplier and supply continuity risks across the Cell Therapy portfolio. • Strengthen strategic partnerships with critical suppliers and prepare the supplier network for global commercial scale. • Improve on-time, in-full (OTIF) performance and reduce the risk of patient-impacting supply disruptions. • Advance dual-sourcing, business continuity, supplier development and new material introduction strategies. • Use analytics, digital capabilities and AI to strengthen risk monitoring, supplier performance and supply assurance. • Develop a global team with expertise spanning supplier risk, SRM, direct materials and supply assurance. Accountabilities Supplier Risk & Portfolio Resilience • Develop, own and continuously improve the Risk Framework for External Supply & Delivery, including supplier risk assessment, risk taxonomy and scoring, mitigation standards, escalation triggers, business continuity and contingency planning. • Lead risk management at the Cell Therapy Technical Operations (CTTO) portfolio level, maintaining consolidated, forward-looking visibility across CDMOs, direct materials, equipment and services, and logistics suppliers. • Lead strategies addressing single-source dependencies, dual sourcing, alternate supplier identification, new material introduction (NMI) and product lifecycle risk. • Strengthen resilience for critical plasmids, raw materials, cold chain and other supply dependencies. • Maintain visibility of supplier sub-tier (n-1), geopolitical and China-related supply risks, including relevant BIOSECURE considerations. • Drive mitigation actions to closure in partnership with External Supply, Quality, Planning and other stakeholders. Supplier Relationship Management • Develop and lead the enterprise Supplier Relationship Management (SRM) framework, including supplier segmentation, governance, service-level agreement (SLA) performance, scorecards, quarterly business reviews and continuous improvement. • Establish and govern the Preferred Supplier List (PSL), helping identify suppliers positioned to support future clinical and commercial requirements. • Establish expectations for root-cause analysis and corrective and preventive action (CAPA) within supplier performance management. • Build consistent supplier performance dashboards covering portfolio health, on-time delivery, quality events, value delivery and suppliers at risk. • Enable consistent adoption of the Risk and SRM frameworks across External Supply, Direct and Indirect Sourcing, Automation & Robotics and China operations. Critical Supplier & Logistics Partnerships • Lead strategic relationships with portfolio-critical suppliers across key materials, logistics, technology and platform capabilities. • Establish executive sponsorship, joint strategic planning, capacity commitments and commercial readiness plans with critical partners. • Lead strategic business reviews and executive-level supplier escalations. • Strengthen the performance of cell therapy logistics partners with focus on patient-centric delivery, cold chain integrity, reliability and logistics cost optimization. • Partner with External Supply on shared portfolio risk reviews, supplier watch lists, supplier development and escalations involving upstream materials or logistics dependencies. End-to-End Direct Materials & Supply Assurance • Own end-to-end direct materials delivery from sourcing outcome through receipt, aligning supplier commitments with manufacturing schedules, CDMO requirements and patient demand. • Lead day-to-day expediting, first-line supply assurance and escalations, partnering with Direct Sourcing, External Supply, Planning and Logistics on recovery actions. • Drive root-cause analysis and sustainable corrective actions to prevent recurring supply issues. • Lead the Direct Sourcing organization through the Director, Supply & Delivery – Direct, enabling effective transition from sourcing and contracting into ongoing supplier management, material delivery and performance governance. Supplier Development & Scale Readiness • Lead supplier development strategies that strengthen capacity, scalability, quality consistency and business continuity across the cell and gene therapy supplier ecosystem. • Conduct capacity assessments and proactive scale-up planning to prepare suppliers for global demand. • Advance dual-source strategies and alternate supplier qualification recommendations for critical materials and categories. • Partner with Automation & Robotics Supply to strengthen supplier readiness for platform deployment. • Build joint devel