After Bea's apprenticeship as a Lab-technican in April 1983, she joined the Carbohydrate Chemistry section in the Central Research Laboratories at Ciba-Geigy Ltd., Basel. After a 2 year extended vocational training, she was promoted in 1990 to Head Lab-technician. In 1996, after the merger of Ciba and Sandoz, Bea moved to the Selectin Antagonist project in the therapeutic area Transplantation. In February 1999 she joined the Institute of Molecular Pharmacy at the University of Basel (Switzerland).