Luxembourg, Luxembourg, Luxembourg
General Manager in Digital/ E-Commerce/ Change Management with a 25 years career, working for leading, global Technology Companies. Former Director at Hewlett-Packard and Amazon.com with experience in launching and scaling businesses in multiple industries across the EU; delivering up to USD 3 Bn topline through multinational teams of 100+ people. P&L and functional responsibility for B2C and B2B Sales & Business Development, Vendor Negotiations, Supply Chain & Availability Management, Marketplace, Product Management & Managing Tech/Engineering-Teams, Marketing & Merchandising, Business Analytics & Automation, Finance.
Obsessing over B2C *and* B2B customer needs across the vast Automotive Aftermarket in Europe.
Mission: “Build GoPuff Europe to become part of the world’s go-to solution for immediate everyday needs.” (i.e. instant delivery of food & non-food items ordered over mobile phone apps). Responsibilities: • Pan-EU P&L-ownership for all perishable grocery lines, i.e. Fresh, Chilled and Frozen lines (UK, FR, ES); Team size: 26. • Driving Assortment Expansion/Experimentation across Beverages, Food, and Non-Food. • Leading cross-functional teams for Supply Chain, Instock Management/ Availability, Space and Unhealthy Stock Mgmt. • Leading GoPuff's EU Category Management analytics, product management & automation team. The main challenge for any Quick-Commerce company is to offer superior customer experience (CX) vs. supermarkets and other convenience shopping options. This requires appealing ‘selection breadth’ across ASP-bands, high availability, attractive pricing and fast/convenient delivery – while still being able to demonstrate a path to profitability on an order-level (i.e. including fast and reliable delivery). The complexities in Europe were even higher as we learned that customer baskets in UK, FR, ES had 40%+ perishable products in them (4x higher than in the US), i.e. products with shelf-life of only 2-10 days. An initial lack of demand weighted Out-of-Stock metrics and a sensible replenishment logic, combined with high customer interest for Meat & Fish, Dairy products, Fruit & Vegetables, Read-to-Eat, Bread, Frozen Food, Ice Cream drove my team to design GoPuff’s first forecasting & replenishment system that predicted sales volumes (P50-P90), recommended replenishment quantities (meeting availability targets), while coping with double-digit WoW demand swings. The logic had to also reduce waste/unhealthy inventory and respect physical and inbound-labor capacity limits for each micro fulfilment center (MFC sizes: 2K to 10K sqft).
Mission: “Scale Amazon’s Pan-European Automotive Parts- and Non-Parts business (launched in 2013) with enhanced Customer Experience, expanded selection, improved availability, sharper pricing, and incremental services - while improving profitability.” Responsibilities: • General Manager & Director, leading Amazon's Automotive business for Europe across EU8. End-to-end responsibility for Vision, Strategy, and execution for a multi-billion P&L that grew 4x in top-line over 5 years. Team size: 120+; • Direct responsibility for the management of a Product Management & Tech/Engineering Team in Luxembourg & Bangalore, India; Supplier Sales & Negotiations team; Instock Management & Supply Chain Programs (including Direct Sourcing, VendorFlex/3PL, and Dropship); Marketing, Pricing & Deals Mgmt; Strategic Vendor Services. The Automotive Aftermarket is highly fragmented with 200M+ SKUs that are mostly vehicle/fitment specific. Such characteristics create substantial challenges for product discoverability, availability, and customer experience. To overcome these challenges and grow the business profitably, a combination of Customer Obsession and Complexity Management are required to spec out features and tools to simplify the navigation (and sourcing) of large selection pools, while addressing the needs of very customer segments. Features and tools requirements have to simultaneously be regionally relevant (keeping CX-improvements agile), while consolidating into a globally scalable platform (i.e. across NA, EU, India/JP).
Mission: “Launch Amazon’s B2B product lines (14+ categories: Business, Scientific and Industrial Supplies (BISS) across EU5 simultaneously to feed Amazon’s ambitions in disrupting B2B e-Commerce.” Responsibilities: • Hire a Pan-EU category team (Vendor Mgmt, Instock, Launch/Product-Mgmt, Pricing) in Luxembourg, London and Bangalore, India. • Set-up EU EU category systems with Seattle, and prepare Amazon's entrance into B2B-categories, i.e. Industrial Tools & Instruments, Test and Measurement, Janitorial and Sanitation, 3D Printing, Hardware, Material Handling, Occupational Health & Safety, Lab Supply, Professional Medical Equipment, and many categories that followed in 2016+ • Establish category reporting mechanisms to drive inputs (vendor pipeline, selection, availability, pricing) and outputs • Drive the sensitive category demarcation between BISS vs. Tools, Health & Personal Care, Softlines/Shoes, etc. • Reorganization of BLR- and LUX-based teams to London (Team size: 27), incl. employees change management and leadership succession planning.
Mission: “Launch and scale Amazon’s in-house print-on-demand/burn-on-demand Books and DVD-business, reaping benefits for customers, content creators and Amazon from a digital supply-chain (with a high-quality physical book or DVD) manufactured in real-time after customer order.” Responsibilities: • Identify opportunities of a digital media-supply-chain (with a manufacturing cell at the end) across long-tail media products (books and DVDs), and for inventory-free JIT-production of head-selection SKUs • Acquire licensing rights from content providers (publishers, authors, and studios) • Launch and grow a CapEx-intensive, but highly profitable business from zero to >100M EUR topline EU-wide • Expand my scope from Sr. Business Development Lead UK to a Sr. Manager and later Pan-EU Director role, while growing the EU-team to 19 (Business Development, Product Management, Scalable Operations and Quality Mgmt)
**Director, Business Development, EU and US: Digital Entertainment (Feb’2004 – Jul’2008)** Responsibilities: • EU and Expat assignment to drive business development for HP's innovative Digital Video Device & Distribution Business in Europe and the US, i.e. an early digital version of Netflix as white-label solution for Walmart, Kroger, Safeway; • Development of a <24hrs production of large-scale Manufacturing-on-Demand capability for DVD titles (in HP's dedicated Sacramento DVD-manufacturing site) • Signing licensing agreements with MLB, NFL, College Football, and NASCAR on fast, post-event inshore-publication of exceptional games and races, distributed through geo-targeted retail partners **Strategic Planning Manager, EU: Imaging & Printing Group (Nov’2002-Jan’2004)** Responsibilities: • EU Business Planning Processes for HP’s Consumer Imaging & Printing Group, • Building and executing quarterly/monthly/weekly business planning and reporting mechanisms • Business Process Optimization: Scoping the design and roll-out of an innovative process and file management system to professionalize the cross-functional planning, execution, and reporting mechanism in the organization ** Management Consultant, Germany: Business Process Improvement & Change Management (Apr’1999 – Nov’2002) ** Responsibilities: • EU Strategy & Change Management Consulting, Business Process Improvement for large EU clients, such as Lufthansa, TetraPak, BMW – as well as Hewlett-Packard (In-house Consulting) • Project vision setting, Roadmap & Risk planning • Process, People, Tools and Project mapping, change implementation and change management