The Board

Karsten started his career with Merck KGaA in 2003 with different roles in Strategic Marketing, Sales Force Effectiveness, Inhouse Consulting and R&D Project Management Office across different therapeutic areas and regions. Karsten is now responsible for the Secondary Data Insights and Market Performance Analytics team supporting Global Franchises & Functions as well as working closely with regional commercial units and Business Development.
Karsten’s previous role was with Global Business Intelligence Oncology on MR, Forecasting and Epidemiology across different indications. He believes EphMRA is key to help the members in accelerating and establishing best practices for overcoming current and future industry challenges.

Dr. Thomas Hein joined Thermo Fisher Scientic ImmunoDiagnostics as Global Director Customer Insight and Strategy in August 2014. He has more than twenty years of experience in market research, most of it in the pharmaceutical industry in the areas of primary and secondary market research as well as forecasting and competitive intelligence.

From 2007 – 2014 he was the Vice President of Global Market Research within Bayer Healthcare Pharmaceuticals with an international team in Berlin, Montville (USA), Singapore, Mexico, China and Switzerland. Prior to that, Dr. Hein was the Vice President of Global Market Research at Schering AG for 5 years.

Before taking these global responsibilities, he was in Market Research of Schering subsidiaries in Germany as well as the USA.

Managing the Association's finances is the Treasurer's role and to ensure that prudent budget management is implemented and resources are effectively allocated and managed.

As General Manager, Bernadette takes the Board initiatives and implements them across the Association. All activities are designed to meet members needs and to support members in their daily work. Effective budget management is key to the Association's success.

Amr has over 20 years experience in healthare market research. He is a regular contributor to EphMRA and has been a familiar face at the annual conference attending every year since 2001. Over the past 5 years he has enjoyed being an active member of the Programme Committee supporting the development throughout the year and the itinerary of the annual conference. In this role Amr has had a unique opportunity to meet and interact with a wide range of members across the industry.

Global POP* Governance Director.
*Patient Oriented Program (POP) is a Novartis umbrella term covering Novartis programs to support patient care, market research or to gain insights from patients/Health Care Professionals.
More than 20 years professional experience (17 years is in the pharmaceutical industry with companies including Novartis, Roche, Gruenenthal, Altana Pharma, Bayer AG), leading international teams (up to 60 people, located in EU, S. America, Africa and USA), in the departments of Research & Development (R&D)/Pharmacovigilance, Quality and Pharma Development.
I worked at global and local level cross functional with other departments (e.g. Medical Affairs, Marketing, Legal and Regulatory Affairs). I have knowledge in different therapeutic areas including, oncology, respiratory, immunology, neuroscience and infectious diseases as well as in Drug Development and Project Management during my role in Roche.

Marcel gained his Master’s degree in International Business Communication Studies in 1999 from Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands and has worked in international healthcare market research for nearly 18 years.
In addition to having led various business units, he has remained a very all-round and well-versed practitioner across all activities in the research life cycle, including recruitment, fieldwork, moderation and reporting. Marcel is passionate about the industry given his involvement in EphMRA's Learning and Development committee and has a particular interest in qualitative research where he is exploring novel methods, such as Natual Language Processing and the use of chatbots
In his current position as Senior Director, he is responsible for SKIM's EU Methodology & Innovation team, leveraging the latest market research developments and trends across all SKIM industries, whereby continuing to execute tried and tested methods whilst experimenting with the latest ones to ensure versatiliy and relevance with our clients.

March 2020 - present
Purdie Pascoe - Director

March 2019 – February 2020
Elma Research - Managing Director, UK (London)

January 2016 – December 2018
Kantar Health - Managing Director, UK (Epsom)

December 2012 – December 2015
GfK - Regional Lead, Healthcare, Asia, GfK (Singapore)

April 2002 – December 2012
Kantar Health (formerly TNS Healthcare - Managing Director, Asia Pacific, Middle East & Africa (Singapore)

October 2000 – April 2002
Synovate - Regional Director, Healthcare, South East Asia (Malaysia)

Prior to moving to Asia in 2000, I held a number of researcher roles, initially with NOP Healthcare (now GfK) and then with TNS Healthcare.

Xander has worked in market research since the early nineties, mostly in or for the pharmaceutical industry. He currently works for Eli Lilly & Company in a cross-therapeutic area international data analytics role. Before that, he supported global, international and affiliate market researchers in matters related to compliance, privacy and regulations.
Prior to joining Lilly, Xander worked for DSM Anti-Infectives, Organon International and IMS.
Xander is a current member of the EphMRA Board, the Code of Conduct Ethics Committee and in the past served on the Learning & Development Committee for several years.

Vijay is a seasoned industry professional with 15 years of experience, spanning both agency and pharmaceutical domains. Currently, he holds a position as a Director in Global Commercial Performance Reporting at AstraZeneca. Vijay's expertise lies in shaping data and technology strategies while delivering a comprehensive view of performance across internal data assets, primary market research, and secondary syndicated data for key AZ brands. His strategic insights and operational prowess have been instrumental in driving success and optimizing commercial outcomes.
Prior to joining AstraZeneca, Vijay worked for Themis Analytics and IQVIA.
Vijay supports EPHMRA by participating in 2 EPHMRA Committees. He is a Co-Chair of the EPHMRA Classification Committee and Chair position on the Data & Systems committee.

Paul has worked in the pharmaceutical industry his entire career and has no intent of changing course. Working on medicines that change people’s lives is incredibly rewarding. He began his career at ZS Associates, supporting both biotech and large pharmaceutical companies on projects spanning sales and marketing. It’s here that he developed a particular passion for market research. Since his consulting days, he has worked in local, regional, and global business units in various market insights leadership roles across Biogen, Shire (later Takeda), and now Vifor. He finds particular motivation in uncovering insights that drive tangible business decisions. Paul began his career in the US, and in 2015 made the leap to Switzerland, where he now lives with his wife, two young kids, and high energy Hungarian vizsla.

Mike is Beyond Blue's in-house branding and communications /positioning expert. He is also our innovation lead. He has worked extensively in rare diseases and across many conditions in oncology, cardiovascular medicine and endocrinology.

I have over 10 years’ experience working in healthcare market research, both agency and client-side across a wide range of indications and different stages of the product lifecycle. I have been at UCB for 5 years, originally joined the EU market research team as insights lead for neurology, managing the Parkinson’s disease and epilepsy portfolio. I have since transitioned to EU insights lead for rare disease, sitting within the global insights hub. My focus is supporting the EU business unit in launching two new assets in a rare neurological condition. As well as working with the global commercial team on preparing for further indications of these assets. I have a Master’s degree in Chemistry and Business Management from the University of Manchester and a PhD in synthetic Chemistry from the University of Warwick.