Elena is a global leader with strong commercial, general management, strategic, and operational skills who drives shareholder value by delivering strong growth on the top and bottom lines internationally through strategic and operational excellence, building high-performing teams, and focusing on results.
Elena currently holds the position of President and CEO of Messer Americas, a wholly owned subsidiary of Messer SE & Co. KGaA. She also serves as COO of the Americas on the Messer global management board, reporting to the Supervisory Board. Messer is the largest privately held industrial gas business in the world and a leading industrial and medical gas company in North and South America. Messer offers over 125 years of expertise in industrial, medical, specialty and electronics gases.
An accomplished executive who has held key positions at Bayer AG, Baxter International, Linde plc, and OMV AG, Elena’s global experience across industries is extensive. She has worked for European, US, and Canadian companies in pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, medical devices, industrial gases, chemicals, energy, mobility, and retail sectors. As a leader Elena clearly formulates and executes strategies for businesses that strengthen competitive position, achieve market and industry leadership, and foster compliance and innovation. She possesses expertise in kick-starting growth of mature assets, developing and launching innovative products, managing in-country tender procurement processes, building global and country-specific portfolios through M&A and partnerships, leading integration of acquired businesses, managing multi-million-dollar industrial CAPEX investments, and overseeing business development of industrial and medical gas applications. She drives productivity and customer-focused improvements using business process knowledge and a pragmatic use of traditional and innovative digital tools to drive operational efficiency. Elena has been recognized for strong and passionate leadership, unwavering credibility and integrity, problem solving, creativity in ambiguous situations, growing businesses in a variety of market models through appropriate go-to-market strategies, cross-cultural and cross-functional diversity & inclusion, multi-lingual skills, and building and leading high-performing teams.
In her last executive position at OMV AG, Elena was an Executive Board Member responsible for B2B and B2C marketing, sales and commodities trading. There she developed a turnaround strategy and oversaw the development of a long-term sustainability strategy for OMV Petrom, a publicly traded subsidiary of OMV in Bucharest, Romania to support profitable growth and achieve net zero targets by 2050. Elena holds a master’s degree in international management from Thunderbird School of Global Management at Arizona State University. She has also completed several continuous improvement leadership and board governance programs including the Director’s Consortium at Stanford Graduate School of Business and Women on Boards governance courses at Harvard Business School. Elena has championed and sponsored efforts that support inclusive, non-discriminatory, merit-based corporate culture. She is a mentor and coach who empowers people and supports their career advancement. Elena has supported multiple charities focused on disaster relief, chronic disease cures, and animal welfare over decades.
