Open Innovation Manager
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The Open Innovation Department of L’Oréal Research and Innovation is responsible to scout, breakthrough Innovation, discoveries, materials, technologies, and products by building a long-term partnership with external partners and transform them into product or services for Loreal.
The candidate will identify disruptive and emerging opportunities from the local market, relevant to L’Oréal’s technical challenges and future cosmetic and business needs. Geographical area of responsibility: Japan - with possibility of scope expansion to Southeast Asia and Australia & New Zealand.
The candidate will be responsible for the precise analysis, benchmarking, and technical positioning of those opportunities. This role will combine a candidate’s ability to recognize and assess cutting edge technologies in a variety of fields and an ability to envision impactful product concepts and business opportunities.
The candidate should have a solid understanding of local and regional deep tech startup ecosystem and other industrial opportunities in the country. Experience in sourcing, evaluating, and investing in technology will be a significant added advantage.
The candidate should have strong experience in collaborating with external partners from the Business Development aspect in building right partnerships such as co- development, licensing of technologies etc.
Key Accountabilities…
◆ Identify, analyze, classify, and segment the emerging technological opportunities from the local ecosystems in alignment with L’Oréal strategic needs and fit and prepare succinct technical briefs on opportunities to highlight new opportunities for partnership.
◆ Develop coherent business plans for partnership opportunities through clearly articulated value proposition analysis, including conceptual positioning, technology benchmarking, IP landscape and a go-to-market proposal.
◆ Coordinate and drive technical and business assessments of locally sourced opportunities through relevant internal decision-making processes.
◆ When required, prepare and initiate contact with partners to strengthen the technical dossier.
◆ Help to frame term-sheets & negotiate contractual clauses for partnerships by actively working with in-house legal & patent lawyers.
◆ Closely coordinate with internal technical teams to help manage further technical engagement with selected partners.
◆ Work together with local, regional, and global Scout, Watch and Business Development teams to continuously improve Open Innovation ways of working.
◆ Conduct local activity in strategic alignment with the global Open innovation frame through an international coordination of the activities.
- Sound scientific knowledge and ability to gauge a broad range of technological and scientific fields, ideally in a Beauty and/or Consumer products market.
- Understanding and experience in handling IP protection, licensing, and financial term sheets. An understanding of venture capital industry and negotiating startup terms sheets will be another advantage.
- Effective communication, analytical, and negotiation skills.
- Strong experience in collaborating with external partners.
- Experience working with international teams.
- Team Player who works well independently and with teams, with demonstrated project management and leadership skills, manages transversal projects, and produces high-quality assessments of scientific concepts.
- Self-starter and dependable.
- Strong interpersonal, collaboration, and presentation skills.
- MSc/PhD in chemical, cosmetics, computational, physical, or life sciences. An MBA or other training in business or finance will be an added advantage.
- Fluency in Japanese and English is must