RITU NADKARNI, Commercial Director, SouthEast US, Biogen

Ritu is a Global Sales/Business Development leader and a Strategic Marketer with 22 years of experience working with some of the top Healthcare systems including Mayo Clinic, Merck vaccines and Biogen. Currently she is the commercial regional director for Southeast Market, leading a team of sales, reimbursement, and account management professional responsible for one fourth of the division’s revenue.  She is passionate about population health initiatives and nurturing high performing diverse teams. Her work has resulted in multi-million-dollar revenue and has been acknowledged by numerous President and Industry awards.

Ritu credits her cultural sensitivity and ability to work well with various constituencies to her experiences of living and working in three different continents and growing up in a multi-generational household. She holds a Master of Business Administration degree from the Thunderbird School of Global Management, Glendale, AZ from where she graduated as a Beta Gamma Sigma honor society member. She also holds a master’s degree in International Business from the Symbiosis Institute of Foreign Trade, Pune, India.

Ritu resides in Houston, TX with her husband Kunal and their son Ayan (12) and daughter Avya (9). In her spare time, she enjoys activities with her family – traveling, participating in half-marathons, long distance bike rides (MS 150) and writing for business publications including the Huffington Post. She is an active contributor in her community and is involved with multiple initiatives related to Education and Diversity & Inclusion. She along with husband founded “Empowering kids for future”, to support and provide opportunities to children from her community. She currently serves on the board of Ronald Mc Donald House (RMHC), Child Rights and You (CRY), and is a fellow of the prestigious American Leadership Forum class XLIX.Equally, Ritu has been an impactful mentor and an ally to many aspiring leaders and was an active participant in mentoring programs such as TENT that supports LGBTQ Refugees.