Finalists for Announced for 2019 ASAP Alliance Excellence Awards

USA - English

• USA - English

CANTON, Mass., Feb. 14, 2019 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- The Association of Strategic Alliance Professionals (ASAP), an international association dedicated to the leadership and practice of alliance management, partnering, and business collaboration, will honor companies and organizations, practices, and programs that exemplify exceptional performance in alliance management during the ASAP Alliance Excellence Awards ceremony at the 2019 ASAP Global Alliance Summit, which runs March 11-13 at the Westin Fort Lauderdale Beach Resort in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

This month, ASAP announced the companies that are 2019 ASAP Alliance Excellence Awards finalists: Alcon Laboratories, Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), Keryx Biopharmaceuticals (now a subsidiary of Akebia Therapeutics), Thermo Fisher Scientific, Merck KGaA, Merck & Co., Bristol-Myers Squibb, Cambridge Assessment English, Novartis, Incyte, Sanofi Pasteur, and Red Hat.

"This remarkable group of companies has demonstrated significant leadership in alliance management during a time of rapid growth and change for business—and for the partnering profession," said Michael Leonetti, president & CEO of ASAP. "Our awards committee reviewed a number of outstanding nominees from diverse industries this year, and we're pleased to recognize these exceptional partners and programs whose success stories and practices can serve as models for the alliance management community."

Volunteer ASAP awards committee members determined that the finalist organizations' alliances have exhibited exceptional leadership, excellence, and significant contributions in the following categories:

• Alliance Program Excellence Award, given to organizations that have instilled the capability to consistently implement and manage alliance portfolios and demonstrate success of those alliances over time.
• Individual Alliance Excellence—Emerging, awarded to an emerging alliance for excellence in planning, implementation, and results achieved by instituting practices, tools, and methodologies in support of successful formation and management.
• Individual Alliance Excellence—Long-Established, which targets a specific alliance for excellence in planning, implementation, and results achieved by instituting practices, tools, and methodologies in support of successful formation and management.
• Alliance for Corporate Social Responsibility, presented for making a profound, measurable, and positive social impact, regardless of profit—although profit is not discouraged.
• Innovative Best Alliance Practice Award, presented alliance management tools, functions, methods, or processes that have made an immediate, powerful, demonstrable impact on the organization and/or discipline of alliance management.

Alcon Laboratories' alliance program contains a complete set of fully documented best practices supported by information technology tools. With a small alliance group, they manage many partners through consistency applying these practices and tools.

Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) has developed an alliance program covers not only the "hard" alliance elements, but also pays attention to the "softer" rules of the game, resulting in substantial contribution to revenues as well as recognition from partners. Partner tiering is consistently worked out across the strategic, financial, and relational elements of business.

Keryx Biopharmaceuticals (now a subsidiary of Akebia Therapeutics) and Thermo Fisher Scientific collaborated to resolve supply constraints to ensure that patients were able to access Keryx's proprietary drug through agility and excellent teamwork at all levels of operation.

Merck KGaA–Bristol-Myers Squibb's alliance has operated with financial transparency and consistent best practices since its formation in China in the 1990s, a time when the Chinese market was much less accessible.

Novartis–Incyte's decade-long collaboration covers the co-marketing and co-development of an oncology drug in split geographical areas. The alliance has applied best practices across the alliance lifecycle, and led the way for a foundation for a broader alliance mindset in the respective organizations.

Merck & Co. and Sanofi Pasteur built a joint venture for a new drug utilizing a governance model inspired by small, nimble biotech companies to ensure speed and flexibility. The commercialization phase of the new drug so far is very successful.

Red Hat completely revamped an alliance training program forits alliance and channel managers, providing a clear learning path for everyone with several checkpoints and feedback options that support managers in their learning. The alliance program has leveraged e-learning and digitization, supported by well-designed management processes.

Cambridge Assessment English teamed up with Future Learn and Crisis Classroom to deliver an online training program for volunteers who help refugees meet refugee needs by focusing on language support. Volunteers (8,000 thus far have signed up) are able to exchange their experience in addition to accessing formal learning modules.

Merck KGaA developed its Joint Committee Self-Assessment tool after alliance surveys showed that decision-making in the organization's alliances were too slow. This easily implemented tool helps committees improve their decision making has become standard in the Merck alliance toolkit.

About the 2019 ASAP Alliance Excellence Awards and Global Alliance Summit

The winners of the annual ASAP Alliance Excellence Awards will be announced during the 2019 ASAP Global Alliance Summit to be held March 11-13 at the Westin Fort Lauderdale Beach Resort in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Platinum Sponsors of the event include Vantage Partners and WorkSpan. The Rhythm of Business is a Gold Sponsor. For more information and to register for the 2019 ASAP Global Alliance Summit, please visit http://asapsummit.org.

About ASAP

The Association of Strategic Alliance Professionals (ASAP) is the only professional association dedicated to elevating and promoting the profession of alliance management, partnerships, and collaboration. Founded in 1998, the organization provides professional development, networking, and resources for cultivating the skills and toolsets needed to manage successful business partnerships. ASAP's professional certifications include the Certificate of Achievement-Alliance Management (CA-AM) and Certified Strategic Alliance Professional (CSAP). Active global members include Astellas, AstraZeneca, Bayer, Cisco, Citrix, Covance, Dassault Systèmes, Eli Lilly and Company, HealthCore, IBM, Janssen—Pharmaceutical Companies of Johnson & Johnson, JDA, Merck, Microsoft, NetApp, Novartis, PTC, Salesforce, SAS, Takeda, The Warren Company, and Xerox.

More information, including the ASAP blog and a complete list of global members, is available at http://www.strategic-alliances.org.

SOURCE ASAP