Lonza reviews

3.5

67% would recommend to a friend

(1,748 total reviews)
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Wolfgang Wienand

73% approve of CEO

57% positive business outlook

Lonza has an employee rating of 3.5 out of 5 stars, based on 1,748 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The Lonza employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Pharmaceutical & Biotechnology industry (3.5 stars).

Reviews by job title

2K reviews
1.0
Oct 20, 2013

Austere, too many managers

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Excellent insurance, if you have money left over to see your physician. It's also a great place to lay low, and collect a paycheck. If your into that sort of thing.

Cons

If you work at the bench, the pay is 33% below the average for the area(March 2013 Bureau of Labor Statistics news release) . In fact, every person I work along side at the Alpharetta facility has a gripe about their wage. Rightfully so. The average salary for the company is in excess of $80k (2012 annual report), but no one who isn't an engineer, or a PhD makes more than the low $40's. Getting a raise is very difficult. You have to threaten to leave. Even then they promise an increase, give you half up-front, then miss the deadline for the rest of the increase. You'll get a vapid response like: the budget is really tight right now, so.... Meanwhile, they've spent your due on travel to and from Switzerland.

3.0
Oct 1, 2013

Highly dynamic. Timeline is everything.

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Lonza is a CMO with a high turnover of customer projects. It gives you high exposure to different manufacturing processes. It is a great place to learn.

Cons

The downside of the high turnover of customer projects is that you will have to work under tremendous time stress. In addition, there has been a lot of organizational changes in the recent years.

1.0
Sep 28, 2013
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Has a large product portfolio; unfortunately almost all of it is built on old worked-over chemistry. They have collected together a lot of companies through acquisitions, most recently Arch Chemicals, and had (up until about mid 2012) some good prospects for building a successful, competitive business.

Cons

After Lonza acquired Arch, they were stuck with such a high debt load that they had to make massive cuts in staff, close down offices, cut product R&D, and in general put themselves on a path to go out of business. Lonza did not learn from the business and technical expertise that came from its acquisitions. They have at all costs protected their Lonza legacy upper and mid-management but sacrificed good leaders that came from the acquired companies. This is playing out very poorly, and has resulted in poor morale. Hard work does not pay off at this company. Instead, the only thing that seems to matter is where you are located. If you happen to be at one of the Arch legacy sites, protect your future by seeking employment somewhere else before your position gets cut.

Viewing 1693 - 1695 of 1,748 Reviews

Glassdoor has 2,352 Lonza reviews submitted anonymously by Lonza employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Lonza is right for you.