Roy Jakobs

His track record over the last 25 years reflects his passion to help address wider societal challenges. He has driven (digital) transformations in energy, scientific information publishing, and health technology in multinational companies. In doing so, he has built high-performing teams, leveraged digital innovation and M&A in business-to-business, business-to-consumer and business-to government segments to create value for multiple stakeholders, including patients, customers and society.

In 2018, Roy joined the Executive Committee as Chief Business Leader of the Personal Health businesses and returned these businesses to growth. Early in 2020, he was put in charge of the turnaround of Connected Care, as Chief Business Leader, where he was at the forefront of managing the COVID crisis response, serving millions of patients and customers with (virtual) monitoring and respiratory care solutions. In 2021, he took responsibility to address the June 2021 Respironics recall notification/field safety notice on behalf of Philips, while continuing to change the delivery of healthcare across care settings, leveraging (digital) technology to improve outcomes at lower cost. He also initiated and led the successful acquisitions of BioTelemetry, Capsule Technologies and Cardiologs, which have significantly enhanced the company’s patient monitoring and diagnostics solutions offering across hospital and ambulatory settings. 

Since joining Philips in 2010, other positions he has held include Business Leader of Domestic Appliances, based in Shanghai, Market Leader for Philips Middle East & Turkey and Chief Marketing Officer for Philips Lighting. Prior to his career at Philips, he held various management positions at Royal Dutch Shell in their retail businesses and at Reed Elsevier, where he transformed the business from print to digital as Managing Director.

Roy was born in the Netherlands. He is married with three children and holds a Master’s in Business Administration from the Radboud University Nijmegen and the Università degli Studi di Bologna, Italy. He also holds a Master’s in Marketing from TIAS School for Business and Society and completed the New Board Program from Nyenrode Business Universiteit, both in the Netherlands. He speaks Dutch, English, German, Italian and Portuguese.