The Future of Global Payroll in Pharma: Lessons from Mundipharma
by activpayroll team
The pharmaceutical industry continues to evolve rapidly, driven by innovation, global collaboration and increasing demand for new treatments and healthcare solutions. With organisations operating across multiple markets, managing a global workforce requires strong foundations across people, processes, technology and governance.
As pharmaceutical companies expand internationally, payroll plays an increasingly important role in supporting business continuity, employee experience and operational visibility. A consistent global payroll approach enables organisations to better understand their workforce, strengthen compliance and create the flexibility needed to support future growth.
Mundipharma’s global payroll transformation provides valuable insight into how organisations can build a more connected and scalable payroll model. By bringing together 28 payrolls across APAC, EMEA and the Americas, Mundipharma created a unified approach designed to improve consistency, governance and global oversight.
Creating A Global Payroll Model to Support Growth
As organisations grow across regions, payroll models naturally develop over time to support changing business needs. Local expertise, country-specific requirements and established processes all play an important role in successful payroll delivery.
However, as global operations mature, organisations often look for opportunities to create greater alignment between countries while maintaining the flexibility needed to meet local requirements.
For Mundipharma, operating across Africa, Asia Pacific, Canada, Europe, Latin America and the Middle East presented an opportunity to bring its payroll landscape together into a more connected global framework.
Prior to the transformation, payroll was supported by more than 30 providers across 28 countries. The programme focused on creating greater consistency, improving visibility and establishing a scalable operating model that could support the organisation’s continued growth.
Balancing Global Consistency with Local Expertise
Effective global payroll transformation is about finding the right balance between standardisation and local knowledge.
While global processes create consistency and stronger governance, local expertise remains essential to ensuring payroll continues to meet country-specific statutory and regulatory requirements.
Working with activpayroll, Mundipharma introduced a centralised global payroll model supported by:
- standardised processes and governance structures
- clearer ownership across global and regional teams
- closer alignment between Payroll, HR, Finance, Treasury and Global Mobility
- a unified approach to managing payroll operations
This created a stronger foundation for consistent payroll delivery while continuing to support the requirements of different jurisdictions.
Technology Supporting Better Payroll Outcomes
Technology continues to be an important enabler of global payroll transformation. However, the greatest value comes when technology supports well-designed processes, improves data quality and provides better visibility.
As part of Mundipharma’s transformation, Workday HRIS integrations helped streamline payroll inputs and improve data accuracy. Global payment solutions enhanced end-to-end processing, while a custom global ledger strengthened financial reporting and reconciliation across Payroll, Finance and Treasury.
Together, these improvements created a more connected payroll environment, supporting greater efficiency and transparency across regions.
The Role of Governance in Global Payroll Success
As global payroll continues to evolve, governance is becoming an increasingly important focus for multinational organisations.
Strong governance provides clarity around ownership, processes, reporting and decision-making, helping organisations maintain consistency as they operate across multiple countries.
Through the transformation, Mundipharma established a more unified approach to payroll management across 28 countries, improving visibility of payroll performance, compliance and costs.
The programme delivered significant outcomes:
- 28 payrolls transitioned within six months
- More than 30 providers consolidated into a single global framework
- Zero payroll failures and no missed pay dates
- More than 1,500 employees supported throughout the transition
Key Lessons for Global Payroll Leaders
Mundipharma’s transformation highlights several considerations for organisations looking to strengthen their global payroll approach:
Build consistency while respecting local requirements
A successful global model combines standardised processes with the local expertise needed to support different markets.
Invest in visibility and governance
Clear processes, reliable data and strong ownership enable better oversight across global operations.
Use technology to enable better decision-making
Integrated systems can improve accuracy, efficiency and insight when supported by the right operating model.
Transformation is built through collaboration
Successful programmes rely on partnership across Payroll, HR, Finance, technology teams and regional stakeholders.
Building The Future of Global Payroll in Pharma
As pharmaceutical organisations continue to expand globally, payroll will play an increasingly important role in supporting workforce strategy, compliance and operational resilience.
Mundipharma’s transformation demonstrates how organisations can create a more connected global payroll model that provides greater consistency, visibility and control while supporting the needs of employees across multiple regions.
Explore the full Mundipharma case study to discover how 28 payrolls were successfully transitioned within six months, creating a stronger foundation for global payroll delivery.