Food and Pharma Manager

airliquidehr; Alberton; On-site; ZAR 1,200,000 - 1,800,000; Full time

Job summary

Air Liquide in South Africa seeks a Food and Pharma Manager to build and execute a market strategy across Southern Africa. You will bridge high-level commercial strategy with hands-on deployment, designing high-value offerings and leading rollout while building competitive advantages across the region. The role demands strong market insight, investment sense and cross-functional collaboration.

Qualifications

• University Degree or Master in Engineering or Business is required.
• At least 6+ years industry experience and demonstrable business acumen.
• Experience with investment processes and ability to translate market insights into viable business cases.
• Strong project management, cross-functional collaboration and influencing skills.
• Knowledge of Food, Pharmaceutical and Medgas industries and Air Liquide models.

Responsibilities

• Develop and execute market strategies for Southern Africa across food, beverage and pharma sectors.
• Bridge commercial strategy with hands-on deployment and rollout across the region.
• Support sales with technical and market insights and partner with commercial teams.

Skills

Market strategy

Project management

Business acumen

Stakeholder management

Communication

Influencing skills

Education

University Degree / Master in Engineering or Business

Job description

How will you CONTRIBUTE and GROW?

As the Food and Pharma Manager, you will be responsible for building and executing a comprehensive market strategy that drives sustained growth across Southern Africa’s food, beverage, and pharmaceutical sectors. You will bridge high-level commercial strategy with hands‑on operational deployment, capturing both short-term revenue opportunities and medium-term growth avenues. In this role, you will not only design high-value offerings tailored to strict regulatory and industry standards but also own their successful rollout and performance across the region while building long-term competitive advantages.

Market Vision and Strategy

• Responsible for market insight and analysis to get a thorough understanding of the market's trends and build a market vision.
• Develop and update the market strategies and associated offers to ensure sustained profitable growth while maintaining a competitive advantage.
• Builds a deep understanding of the customer base, including persona definition & its update, identifies the customers' needs in their respective markets and determines potential business opportunities for profitable growth.
• Develop the business case for investment decisions with Business Fundamentals and gas pricing in line with AL investment processes at country and group level.
• Monitoring competitor activity and potential next moves.

Business Development

• Remains updated with the Market ecosystem (ex regulatory evolutions, innovative breakthroughs, technical and research institutes) and innovations brought through ALTEC, R&D, WBL, & other clusters.
• Develop new offer packages and develop go to market strategies which are rolled out in conjunction with the commercial teams.
• Plan and conduct trials in order to prove the technical feasibility and economic viability of proposed new products/applications/services.
• Supports the sales team with technical visits to priority prospects.

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Are you a MATCH?

Educational requirements

• Education: University Degree / Master in Engineering/ Business

Experience

• At least 6 or more years industry experience
• Demonstrable business acumen
• Investment process experience
• Strong project management skills
• Business partnering, relationship management and influencing skills
• Good communication skills are essential, particularly in regard to presenting to management and customers
• Ability to deliver through others (Transversally)

Knowledge and Know-how specific to the job

• Food and Pharmaceutical and Medgas industry knowledge
• Industry knowledge
• Business development acumen
• Air Liquide business models and approaches

Our Differences make our Performance

At Air Liquide, we are committed to build a diverse and inclusive workplace that embraces the diversity of our employees, our customers, patients, community stakeholders and cultures across the world.
We welcome and consider applications from all qualified applicants, regardless of their background. We strongly believe a diverse organization opens up opportunities for people to express their talent, both individually and collectively and it helps foster our ability to innovate by living our fundamentals, acting for our success and creating an engaging environment in a changing world.