Tobias Zimmermann

Head of Strategy & Innovation Management @ BASF | Performance Chemicals

Germany

About

With a strong academic background in the field of organic chemistry and biochemistry, educated at the universities of Tübingen, Melbourne and Oxford, I obtained my PhD from the Max-Planck-Institute in Dortmund. I started my professional carreer at BASF as laboratory manager in the small R&D site Trostberg (Bavaria), working on polymers for construction, oilfield and mining applications. Customer interaction and production support was part of my role in R&D. Moving along the lines of technology, in a role combining new business development (NBD) and a global responsibility for a biocatalytic, enzymatic production technology I moved to Ludwigshafen. After around two years I switched gears and joined the corporate center, for a role in strategic controlling and innovation management for BASF Group. Currently I am leading an expert group within our catalyst division supporting and developing our global catalyst production footprint.

Experience

  • BASF (14 yrs 4 mos)
    • Head of Strategy & Innovation Management
      Jan 2025 - Present · 1 yr 7 mos

    • Global Site Development Lead
      Sep 2022 - Jan 2025 · 2 yrs 5 mos

      Continuous Improvement in global Chemical Catalysts Operations

    • Strategic Controlling & Innovation Management
      Oct 2019 - Oct 2022 · 3 yrs 1 mo

  • PhD Thesis at Max Planck Institute of Molecular Physiology
    Jun 2008 - Mar 2012 · 3 yrs 10 mos

    Natural product & enantioselective synthesis, enzyme assays, protein crystallography, small molecule microarrays, collaboration with RIKEN Institute, Tokyo

  • Master Thesis (Diplomarbeit) at University of Oxford
    Oct 2007 - Mar 2008 · 6 mos

    Diploma Thesis in natural product synthesis (University of Tübingen), biochemical assays and protein crystallography (University of Oxford)