Success Story: AstraZeneca & Gympass

Founded in 1999 from the merger of Swedish laboratory Astra AB and the British pharmaceutical company Zeneca Group, AstraZeneca is a global biopharmaceutical company with more than 70,000 employees in 100 countries, including the United States, Mexico, Germany, the United Kingdom, and Brazil. As part of its focus on drug innovation and development, AstraZeneca is responsible for the elaboration, manufacture, and distribution of one of the main vaccines against Covid-19, currently authorized for use in at least 80 countries.

The company’s goal of providing the best possible benefits and health solutions extends to its employees as well as its patients. In addition to its existing employee support program (Programa de Apoio ao Colaborador, or PAC), which includes social and legal assistance services, AstraZeneca also offers its employees in Brazil Gympass, the most complete health and well-being platform.

Simplifying Processes

The People Services area, part of the company’s HR structure, is responsible for managing employee benefits and is always looking for ways to simplify its processes, shifting the focus away from operational issues to what really matters – people. For Renata Rezende, manager of HR Operations & Solutions for Brazil, the answer is finding partners that offer several solutions in a single service: “Nowadays, with a single partner, you can optimize your work by covering several pillars at once.” 

The implementation of Gympass was a request from AstraZeneca employees themselves, it is not for nothing that the adhesion has already reached more than 60% in the company. But the platform, of course, fulfills the wishes of both employees and HR.

As a unique platform for accessing gyms, online classes, and a full range of wellness apps, including meditation, therapy, and nutrition, Gympass offers freedom of choice for employees – and operational freedom for HR. Leadership is one of AstraZeneca’s main corporate values, extending even to the choice of benefits. As Renata explains, “The more autonomy I can give employees, the more I reinforce our culture of self-leadership, the ownership that we talk about so much.”

A Competitive Differential

Gympass has also helped AstraZeneca remain competitive in the industry thanks to its robust employee benefits package. With companies increasingly encouraging flexible workdays and benefits for achieving a work-life balance, Gympass is a unique solution for improving employee quality of life, encompassing physical activity, nutritional counseling, therapy and meditation, live classes, and even financial advice.

Being able to see how often employees use the platform is very important, Renata emphasizes. This was not possible with the reimbursement benefit offered previously. “How do I know if people are actually using a particular benefit? Gympass is a benefit that is easy to manage, and you can invest knowing that it will fulfill its purpose”. 

Like Gympass, AstraZeneca believes in providing a better quality of life for its employees, a goal it pursues with the best partners. According to Renata, “we can see that our investment is going to an employee who is actually using the benefit and that it is fulfilling its function: as an investment in health. Gympass is an extremely relevant partner for us.”