Executive Director – Central Market Access Strategy & Regional Market Access (North Region)

DUTIES & RESPONSIBILITES
1. Central Market Access Strategy

• Lead the development and execution of central market access strategies aligned with business priorities, with a focus on national reimbursement, healthcare policy, and VBP-related policy developments.
• Establish and sustain compliant, long-term strategic partnerships with central-level stakeholders, including the National Healthcare Security Administration (NHSA), National Health Commission (NHC), HEOR key opinion leaders (KOLs), and relevant policy, academic, and research institutions.
• Monitor, analyze, and interpret evolving national healthcare and reimbursement policies, and provide timely insights and business impact assessments to senior internal stakeholders, including the General Manager, Business Unit Vice Presidents, and global pricing and access teams.
• Lead cross-functional central and regional access strategy planning to ensure strong alignment, coordinated execution, and policy advocacy excellence across products and geographies.
• Partner closely with Therapy Area Pricing and HEOR teams to oversee HEOR project planning and management, and ensure evidence generation is aligned with access strategy and brand priorities.
• Shape and support policy advocacy initiatives that foster a favorable access environment and improve reimbursement opportunities, patient accessibility, and affordability for priority products.

2. Regional Market Access – North Region
Lead regional market access strategy and execution across the North Region to ensure strong product access and effective implementation of national and local reimbursement and healthcare policies.
Key stakeholder engagement

• Build and maintain effective, compliant relationships with provincial and municipal stakeholders, including healthcare security administrations, health commissions, procurement platforms, associations, research institutions, commercial insurance companies, and third-party administrators (TPAs).

Medical insurance and commercial insurance access

• Ensure timely local implementation of National Reimbursement Drug List (NRDL) policies across the region.
• Drive inclusion of key products into regional derivative reimbursement lists, including separate payment lists, outpatient chronic disease lists, special disease lists, and dual-channel lists.
• Lead City Supplementary Insurance (CSI) initiatives and drive inclusion of priority products into relevant special drug lists, including domestic and, where applicable, overseas coverage lists.
• Develop and lead regional DRG/DIP access strategies, mobilizing cross-functional teams to assess business impact and define brand-level and hospital-level action plans.
• Identify policy gaps and reimbursement risks that may affect product listing or patient access, and lead cross-functional advocacy efforts to improve reimbursement outcomes, patient accessibility, and affordability.
• Resolve ad hoc reimbursement and listing issues escalated by regional sales teams in a timely and effective manner.

Tender and VBP

• Ensure timely and accurate tender listing for priority products across the region.
• Maintain pricing discipline by assessing policy impacts and pricing risks, developing mitigation plans, and escalating key issues promptly to management.
• Lead regional VBP projects through cross-functional coordination, including interpretation of policy and bidding rules, strategic recommendation development, and support to brand teams on bidding approaches.
• Drive regional policy advocacy related to tendering and VBP to support sustainable access outcomes.
• Healthcare policy implementation
• Monitor regional healthcare policy developments and provide actionable insights to relevant internal stakeholders.
• Shape and support regional implementation of policies related to NEDL, NBPHS, KMDL, and other relevant healthcare lists and programs.
• Coordinate internal and external stakeholders to support integration of diagnosis and treatment pathways where relevant to access objectives.

3. Team and Organization Leadership

• Build and lead a high-performing team with strong capabilities in compliance, market access expertise, strategic thinking, and cross-functional collaboration.
• Develop talent pipelines and succession plans to ensure organizational continuity and long-term capability building.
• Refine team competency models and strengthen performance management, development, and incentive mechanisms to support business and people outcomes.

REQUIREMENTS

• Bachelor’s degree required; degrees in Pharmacy, Health Economics, Public Health, or Medicine preferred.
• MBA or MPA is a plus.
• 15+ years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry across both access strategy and regional market access, including 5+ years in leadership or people management roles.
• Strong knowledge of China’s healthcare system, reimbursement landscape, and regional market access variations, with deep payer insight.
• Strong business acumen and strategic thinking, with the ability to synthesize complex information and make sound decisions in fast-changing and ambiguous environments.
• Proven ability to build networks and communicate effectively with both internal and external stakeholders.
• Proficient in English.

AstraZeneca embraces diversity and equality of opportunity. We are committed to building an inclusive and diverse team representing all backgrounds, with as wide a range of perspectives as possible, and harnessing industry-leading skills. We believe that the more inclusive we are, the better our work will be. We welcome and consider applications to join our team from all qualified candidates, regardless of their characteristics. We comply with all applicable laws and regulations on non-discrimination in employment (and recruitment), as well as work authorisation and employment eligibility verification requirements.