A Temporary Head of IT - to Avoid Losing Valuable Time.

Solvias is a world leader in contract research, development, and manufacturing. The company's headquarters are located in Kaiseraugst in the canton of Aargau in Switzerland.  Solvias serves the  biotech and pharmaceutical industry with more than 800 employees in Switzerland, France, the Netherlands, and the USA, operating at the highest standards and in compliance with ISO, cGMP and GLP.

Strong growth calls for qualified people

Solvias is undergoing a strong growth phase. Its IT needed to be modernized to accommodate this growth. It quickly became clear that the IT organization also needed to be expanded. In order for the CIO of the group to be able to focus on international and group-wide projects and strategy, the vacant position of the local Swiss IT manager had to be filled immediately. As is generally known, recruiting IT specialists is not easy; available qualified IT leaders with experience are scarce. This is where the UMB offer comes in: UMB Head of IT ad interim means being able to count on the expertise of an experienced Head of IT - on demand and on site, without the cost of a full-time position. Solvias took advantage of this offer. UMB provided an ad interim Head of IT quickly. He will oversee the operation and continued development of Solvias' IT infrastructure until a new, permanent Head of IT is recruited.

Management positions must be filled quickly and soundly

The UMB Consulting team draws on a pool of experienced IT executives from a wide range of industries and company sizes. They were able to propose two fitting profiles to Solvias. Once the decision was made, the selected UMB Senior Consultant was able to start working for the client within ten days.

Thanks to their broad experience, the new Head of IT ad interim was able to work with the Group CIO, on the same level, right from the start. This was important: Familiarization with the situation and assuming  the responsibility for the local IT team and the various service providers had to happen quickly in order to ease the burden of the Solvias Group CIO.

Building on highly skilled and qualified specialists

For Solvias, it was well worth filling the vacant position with an ad interim solution from UMB, says Jean-François Flahaut, CIO of Solvias Group. "Growth and constant change require management positions to be filled quickly. UMB's ad interim Head of IT made this possible and at the same time provided the necessary drive to modernize our IT."

This solution allowed Solvias to maintain a fast pace of operation. Even better: Once the new permanent Head of IT is found, UMB can provide the best possible support for onboarding and efficiently carry out the necessary knowledge transfer to assist the Solvias Group CIO in the transition.