Dave Williams, Chief Information & Digital Officer, Merck

Dave Williams is the Chief Information and Digital Officer for Merck. He is a member of Merck's Executive Committee and is responsible for global Information Technology and helping the company leverage digital solutions to achieve business value.
Previously, Dave held multiple roles in Merck Animal Health including Chief Information Officer, head of Animal Health Ventures and head of Sure Petcare, where he had P&L responsibility for a business offering digital services and solutions to improve the health and safety of companion animals. Dave was also a member of the Merck Animal Health Executive Leadership Team
Over his 7+ years in Merck Animal Health, Dave was instrumental in developing and executing a digital transformation which included the deployment of several cloud-based platforms and capabilities that helped drive business value through streamlined operations and improved customer engagement.
During that time, Dave also founded Merck Animal Health Ventures
(AHV), a start-up inside of Merck Animal Health that focused on bringing together capabilities across veterinarians, start-ups, inventors, entrepreneurs, customers and investment partners. AHV was a key catalyst for Merck's acquisition of Antelliq in 2019, a global leader in animal intelligence, which added animal identification, monitoring and artificial intelligence capabilities to Merck's portfolio.

Prior to his leadership roles in Animal Health, Dave was Executive Director of Enterprise Information Management at Merck and held several IT leadership roles at Schering-Plough, including Divisional Information Officer (DIO) for corporate systems. The first 10 years of Dave's career included roles in healthcare, chemical industries and consulting, where he had the opportunity to work with a variety of companies ranging from start-ups to global multi-national corporations.
Dave passionately believes an IT organization that combines the right technologies with capable people can make a profound difference in a business' ability to innovate, adapt and serve its customers. Of these two ingredients, he believes people are the most important - and the greatest competitive advantage can be found in building an organization that attracts and develops extraordinary people.
Dave currently serves on the board of the National Center for Women in Technology (NCWIT) and is a member of the Osage Partners Advisory Council.
Dave has a Bachelor of Science in economics and finance from the University of Scranton.