• Piet de Paepe, Senior Partner and Global Practice Lead for Bain’s Chemicals practice, and Gaute Andreassen, Partner, Middle East, will join global CEOs to discuss how innovation, AI and new collaboration models are shaping the future of the chemical industry.

Middle East:  Bain & Company will participate in the 19th Annual GPCA Forum, held December 8–11, 2025 at Exhibition World, Bahrain.

A central feature of the event is the Leadership Dialogue, moderated by Piet de Paepe on December 10 (9:45–11:00). The session, called Innovation at the Crossroads: Demand-Pull vs. Technology-Push – What Shapes the Future? will convene senior industry leaders:

  • Piet de Paepe, Senior Partner, and Global Practice Lead for Bain’s Chemicals practice
  • Dr. Hans Bohnen, CEO, Röhm GmbH
  • Steve Prusak, President & CEO, Chevron Phillips Chemical Company
  • Dr. Stefan Doboczky, CEO, Borealis AG

Together, they will explore how chemical and energy companies can balance market-driven needs with technology-led breakthroughs to accelerate innovation, strengthen competitiveness, and build long-term resilience.

Key themes from the panel will include:

  • Innovation models are shifting toward faster, more customer-centric R&I, supported by accelerating progress in downstream and applied innovation.
  • AI’s accelerating role, from material discovery and process optimization to cutting development cycles from years to months.
  • Talent pressures, driven by shortages of digitally native engineers and rising demand for data science capabilities.
  • Circularity and sustainability, where commercial viability, regulation, and ecosystem collaboration remain decisive constraints.
  • Structural industry headwinds, with leaders emphasizing bold innovation, not cost-cutting, as the path forward.

Piet de Paepe commented “Innovation needs both speed and strategic direction. Balancing demand-led opportunities with technology-driven advances helps companies respond to market shifts while building durable advantage. AI is raising the bar for research productivity and time-to-impact. At GPCA, we’ll unpack what this means in practice.”

Gaute Andreassen added “The industry’s challenges around circularity and sustainability require new ways of working, combining chemical expertise with AI, data and cross-value-chain collaboration. This is where the next generation of breakthroughs will come from.”

Bain & Company’s delegation will engage with participants throughout the forum, sharing practical approaches for integrating innovation, AI and sustainability into R&I and operations to deliver long-term value in a more complex industrial environment.

Editor’s Note – For interviews or further information, please contact:
Christine Abi Assi – christine@daydreamer.agency

About Bain & Company

Bain & Company is a global consultancy that helps the world’s most ambitious change makers define the future. Across 65 cities in 40 countries, we work alongside our clients as one team with a shared ambition to achieve extraordinary results, outperform the competition, and redefine industries. We complement our tailored, integrated expertise with a vibrant ecosystem of digital innovators to deliver better, faster, and more enduring outcomes. Our 10-year commitment to invest more than $1 billion in pro bono services brings our talent, expertise, and insight to organizations tackling today’s urgent challenges in education, racial equity, social justice, economic development, and the environment.

We earned a platinum rating from EcoVadis, the leading platform for environmental, social, and ethical performance ratings for global supply chains, putting us in the top 1% of all companies. Since our founding in 1973, we have measured our success by the success of our clients, and we proudly maintain the highest level of client advocacy in the industry.