Director of Engineering - AIDD Product Engineering

Roche • South San Francisco, CA

1d

About The Position

A healthier future. It’s what drives us to innovate. To continuously advance science and ensure everyone has access to the healthcare they need today and for generations to come. Creating a world where we all have more time with the people we love. That’s what makes us Roche. Advances in AI, data, and computational sciences are transforming drug discovery and development. Roche’s Research and Early Development organisations at Genentech (gRED) and Pharma (pRED) have demonstrated how these technologies accelerate R&D, leveraging data and novel computational models to drive impact. Seamless data sharing and access to models across gRED and pRED are essential to maximising these opportunities. The new Computational Sciences Center of Excellence (CoE) is a strategic, unified group whose goal is to harness the transformative power of data and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to assist our scientists in both pRED and gRED to deliver more innovative and transformative medicines for patients worldwide. The Opportunity In the AI for Drug Discovery group at Genentech, we are at the forefront of transforming drug discovery through Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning. We are building the Lab-in-the-Loop, Genentech’s flagship AI platform for therapeutic molecular design. This platform is central to accelerating the discovery of new medicines by integrating massive quantities of experimental data to train predictive AI models. We seek a Director of Software Engineering to serve as a strategic leader, owning the design, development, and long-term direction of this critical platform. You will be accountable for a significant functional portfolio, ensuring the platform’s impact scales across the entire Roche enterprise and drives revolutionary outcomes in drug design. We are seeking a visionary technical leader who pairs deep full-stack expertise with the ability to manage complex organizational functions. The ideal candidate possesses a proven record of shaping 8–12 month strategic roadmaps and designing robust service architectures that support global research efforts. You thrive on high-level ownership, managing results through lower management levels and high-level individual contributors to move products from concept to large-scale production. As an emerging leader in the field, you will influence strategy across the organization, making critical decisions that impact budgets, resource planning, and long-term technical excellence. You will collaborate closely with Prescient's AI scientists and engineers, Computational Sciences Center of Excellence (CS COE) colleagues, and senior leadership within Genentech Research & Early Development (gRED) and Antibody Engineering. Your role is essential in identifying, strategizing, and productionalizing high-impact AI applications, acting as a key point of contact for VPs and Directors across the Roche group. Prescient Design offers a dynamic, multidisciplinary environment where you will lead efforts to bridge cutting-edge AI research with enterprise-grade software, leveraging internal data sources and top-tier academic links to redefine the drug discovery pipeline.

Requirements

• 8+ years of software engineering work experience, with a proven track record of delivering complex, full-stack applications at an enterprise scale.
• Proven expertise in front-end development using modern frameworks (e.g., React, Angular) and building intuitive, user-centered interfaces for complex scientific workflows.
• Extensive experience leading and mentoring teams of software engineers, with the ability to manage through others to achieve long-term technical results.
• Intense curiosity about the biology of disease and eagerness to contribute to scientific and computational efforts as a recognized leader in the field.
• Proficiency with Python and SQL, with expert knowledge of modern software architecture patterns including Serverless and Microservices.
• Domain experience in drug discovery, computational biology, bioinformatics, or cheminformatics, with the ability to independently collaborate with senior scientific stakeholders.
• Ph.D., MS, or equivalent professional work experience demonstrating clear evidence of independent thought, innovation, and strategic thinking.

Responsibilities

• Contribute to and own the strategic roadmap for the Prescient "Lab-in-the-Loop" platform, guiding product features and technical architecture to maximize AI impact in drug discovery over an 8–12 month planning horizon.
• Take a leading role in the full-stack design and development of scalable, reliable software systems, including crafting responsive and intuitive front-end applications that form the core of our AI/ML platform.
• Collaborate closely with Machine Learning Scientists, AI Engineers, and experimental specialists, translating complex scientific workflows into intuitive user interfaces, dashboards, and analytics tools with a strong focus on user experience.
• Lead and mentor a team of technical staff, fostering best practices, high-quality engineering, and a culture of psychological safety while driving development goals.
• Explore and implement integrations with novel AI agents and models to enhance platform capabilities and automate complex tasks, identifying gaps and opportunities across the wider software landscape.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Director
• Education Level: Ph.D. or professional degree
• Number of Employees: 5,001-10,000 employees