Innovation Operations Manager

BIOptimizers

1d•$100,000 - $150,000•Remote

About The Position

BiOptimizers is seeking an experienced Innovation Operations Manager to investigate and evaluate new product and business opportunities beyond the company’s established capsule and powder dietary supplements. The role assesses whether early-stage concepts are technically feasible, manufacturable, compliant, and commercially profitable, then either advances viable concepts toward commercialization or recommends closing them out. It is a hands-on, cross-functional role with no supporting staff, requiring the manager to personally conduct research, build financial models, engage vendors, and run trials. The manager owns the innovation intake queue and establishes a disciplined, capacity-bound stage-gate process with defined evaluation budgets, timelines, kill criteria, and formal decision points. The role develops business cases and unit economics; leads regulatory, intellectual property, and claims due diligence; coordinates samples, pilots, testing, and validation; and carries greenlit concepts through their first successful commercial production run before handing them off to the standing product and operations team. The manager also documents evaluated concepts and communicates realistic timelines, costs, risks, and resource needs to stakeholders. This is a fully remote position. The role requires a U.S. location and overlap with Eastern Time for cross-functional coordination. The company’s shared collaboration window is 9:00 AM–5:00 PM EST, but this is not a required work schedule; employees are encouraged to work flexibly while attending required meetings, communicating across time zones, and meeting deadlines.

Requirements

At least 7 years of demonstrated success as a project manager, ideally with exposure to product development, innovation, or new-category exploration.
Experience in dietary supplements, nutraceuticals, food and beverage, CPG, or pharmaceutical industries.
Extensive experience with R&D and formulation processes, manufacturing technical capabilities, and regulatory frameworks such as FDA, DSHEA, and cGMP.
Strong background in ingredients and their technical use in dietary supplements.
Hands-on experience with novel delivery formats such as liposomal or encapsulation technologies, softgels, gummies or jellies, sprays, sachets, or functional beverages.
Strong organizational skills and ability to manage multiple projects and priorities simultaneously.
Strong written and verbal communication skills, including translating technical concepts for diverse audiences and influencing stakeholders.
Strong analytical skills, including structuring feasibility assessments, evaluating data, and building business cases.
Fluency with project management systems or tools such as Asana, Monday.com, Smartsheet, MS Project, Jira, or similar.
Ability to operate in ambiguity and create clarity in early-stage, undefined projects.
A track record of completing projects: at least one novel or first-of-its-kind product, format, or process personally taken from early concept through commercial launch.
Judgment and confidence to recommend and defend unfavorable decisions to senior stakeholders, including founders and executives invested in a concept.
Financial literacy to independently build COGS build-ups, margin and break-even models, and basic business cases in Excel or Google Sheets.
Ability to critically evaluate scientific literature, supplier technical packets, specifications, and certificates of analysis and ask informed questions of formulators and manufacturers.
Availability for coordination during U.S. business hours, overlap with EST, and U.S. location.

Nice To Haves

Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field such as business, science, engineering, or a related discipline.
PMP or equivalent certification.
Experience commercializing an ingredient or raw material B2B, including specification development, GRAS/NDI dossiers, toxicology and safety packages, and ingredient customer support.
Experience outside ingestible products, such as consumer hardware, devices, or wellness equipment, including sourcing, certification, and safety testing.
Experience operating a formal stage-gate or phase-gate innovation process.

Responsibilities

Identify, research, and investigate innovation concepts, including opportunities outside existing product formats and categories, to assess technical and commercial feasibility.
Work with formulators and R&D teams to understand concepts, scientific foundations, technical requirements, and constraints.
Design and conduct structured feasibility analyses covering technical viability, manufacturability, cost, regulatory considerations, timelines, and commercial potential.
Identify, vet, and manage external vendors, contract manufacturers, laboratories, consultants, and specialists; prepare RFQs and manage contract-manufacturer quoting and award processes.
Synthesize findings into business cases and evidence-based recommendations on whether concepts should be commercialized or deemed unviable.
Own project plans, timelines, budgets, milestones, and stakeholder communications across concurrent innovation initiatives, personally conducting research, building models, managing vendors, and running trials.
Present findings, risks, and recommendations to leadership and cross-functional stakeholders.
Own the innovation intake queue: log concepts from all sources, conduct initial screens, and maintain a ranked, capacity-bound queue with leadership.
Establish and enforce a phased evaluation process with time and spend budgets, pre-agreed kill criteria, formal gate reviews, and escalation when budgets are exceeded.
Build COGS and landed-cost scenarios, MOQ analyses, pricing and margin models, break-even volumes, and capital-investment assessments against margin hurdles.
Assess patent landscape and freedom to operate; review ingredient regulatory status, label and claims substantiation requirements, and requirements for categories outside DSHEA, including devices, equipment, and non-ingestible products.
Coordinate bench samples, pilot and scale-up trials, stability and shelf-life testing, sensory evaluation, analytical method development, draft specifications, and sourcing of necessary labs and partners.
Carry greenlit concepts through the first successful commercial production run and formally hand them off with specifications, vendor agreements, cost models, and documentation.
Maintain an innovation knowledge base documenting evaluated concepts, findings, costs, decisions, and conditions for reconsideration.
Set realistic expectations about timelines, costs, and resource requirements, and negotiate core-team involvement rather than drawing on core-team capacity ad hoc.
Within the first year, establish a repeatable feasibility-evaluation process, build a network of trusted external partners, and deliver clear go/no-go recommendations.
Within the first 12 months, put a documented intake, prioritization, and stage-gate process into active use with a leadership-visible queue; support greenlit concepts with validated COGS models and vetted manufacturing partners; and advance at least one concept to a first commercial production run or launch-ready handoff.