Siddika Demir served as the FY11 SWE president.
Siddika Demir is the Head of Business Process Excellence for Contract Manufacturing Operations (CMO) at Genentech Inc., a member of the Roche Group. Headquartered in South San Francisco, Genentech is among the world’s leading biotech companies, with multiple products on the market for serious or life-threatening medical conditions. Demir oversees the department that is responsible for the operational excellence and business process management activities in CMO. Her team applies proven tools (e.g., Lean/DMAIC) to achieve planned and predictable process performance and deliver breakthrough results. Before this role, Demir served as the Associate Director of Operational Excellence (OE) and Training for Engineering-Americas. She managed the OE Department, which supported Engineering and Corporate Facilities Services. She led OE in meeting Corporate Engineering’s goals in continuous process improvement, customer satisfaction, staff development, and efficiency.
Before joining Genentech, Demir worked at Bechtel Corporation as the Manager of Corporate Services Six Sigma. She led the Six Sigma activities in finance, legal, risk management, and corporate services. During her 11 years at Bechtel, Demir contributed to a broad range of activities in design engineering, procurement, contracts, estimating, and project controls in Houston and San Francisco. Demir obtained her bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from the University of Houston and master’s in civil engineering from Purdue University.
Demir joined the collegiate section of SWE at the University of Houston (UH) in 1990 and was the president. In SWE, she served as the Houston Area Section president, vice president, and treasurer; publicity chair of the annual conference in 1998; Golden Gate Section representative; collegiate section counselor; coordinator of two national-level awards; Region A Governor and the Director of Education on the SWE Board. She is a member of the Project Management Institute and the American Society for Quality.
Demir was recognized as the SWE Emerging Leader in Quality (2006), UH Distinguished Young Engineering Alumna (2003), SWE Distinguished New Engineer (2000), Young Engineer of the Year in Houston (2000), UH Outstanding Young Alumna (1999), and Outstanding Engineering Student Award recipient (1993 and 1991). She received the Outstanding Student Service Award by the UH Cullen College of Engineering and the Best Senior Honors Thesis Award recipient at UH (1993). She was elected to Who’s Who Among Students in American Universities and Colleges in 1993 and Who’s Who in Turkey in 1996.
Demir has published two papers in engineering and contributed to the book Giving Much/Gaining More: Mentoring for Success by the Purdue University Press, 2002.
Demir is an avid reader and enjoys exchanging books with her friends. Recently, Demir started improving her German to assist in her work and her international travels. She is married to Emre Velipasaoglu, Ph.D. Together, they enjoy traveling, dancing, and trying the different cuisines across the globe.
