Principal Scientist
sanofiWaltham (MA)
About the role
Overview:
In this Senior Scientist role, you will lead scale-up of cell culture bioprocesses from bench to pilot (200L–2000L) within the Genomic Medicine Cell Therapy Development Group in Waltham. You will act as a technical SME, driving process understanding, robustness, and cross-functional alignment with downstream and manufacturing teams. Your work translates lab findings into scalable manufacturing processes that support an immunotherapy-focused pipeline. This is a hands-on, impact-oriented position at the intersection of science and engineering with a strong leadership dimension. Compensation / Benefits health and wellbeing benefits 14 weeks’ gender-neutral parental leave growth opportunities and career development competitive rewards package promotion or lateral move opportunities global/interactive collaboration opportunities
Responsibilities:
Lead scale-up activities from bench scale to pilot (200L–2000L) using engineering principles to ensure large-scale comparability Collaborate with process development scientists to translate lab findings into scalable manufacturing processes Review and approve JSAs written by equipment owners and provide feedback Train employees on best practices for safety, efficiency, and operations Build robust interfaces with the CMC community and promote adoption of best practices Demonstrate expertise in upstream process operations across scales Lead RCA investigations for process deviations and equipment failures at pilot scale Present findings to senior management and external stakeholders at conferences
Key requirements:
Master’s degree in Chemical Engineering, or related discipline with minimum 6 years in large-scale bioreactors, or Ph.D with minimum 4 years in industry related to large-scale bioreactors Strong background in cell culture bioreactor operations and scale-up technologies Biotech/pharma industry experience in a cell culture role with strong operational excellence Experience with perfusion process operations at various scales Understanding of engineering principles related to cell culture processes Ability to lead matrix teams for operations and lab management leadership and mentorship cross-functional collaboration effective communication upstream bioprocessing cell culture bioreactor operations scale-up from bench to 2000L
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