Head of Laboratory Automation – AbCellera – Vancouver, BC Freelance

We are building state-of-the-art facilities in Vancouver and have just announced a 380,000sq ft tech hub. As our team continues to grow, we’re looking for a driven and experienced professional to lead our Lab Automation group. The Head of Laboratory Automation will focus on developing and executing a strategy to design, build, and deploy a high throughput antibody production facility. This role requires constant collaboration with scientific teams and cross-functional peers to ensure we are delivering the most efficient and advanced antibody production facility.

As a Lab Automation leader, you thrive in a fast paced, highly engaged environment, and look to challenge the status quo in order to drive a world class antibody production facility. You are passionate about automation, robotics, and science, keeping AbCellera as a leader in the industry. You will be responsible for staffing, training, and leadership of the Lab Automation team .

How you might spend your days:
Developing and executing a strategy to build and maintain an antibody production facility with the goal of delivering a scalable and modular facility to keep up with AbCellera’s rapid growth and expanding capabilities.

Providing leadership and developing objectives to deliver Business Plan Goals as they relate to throughput, quality, and equipment/process effectiveness and efficiency.

Generating analytical insights to inform operational efficiency and quantify impact while identifying opportunities for technical and platform improvement.

Partnering with internal teams to develop a cohesive communication strategy on how to optimize our workflow and biological assays for automation.

Evaluating and staying up-to-date with the latest innovations in laboratory automation and robotics to incorporate into the production workflow.

Managing, developing, and growing a high-performing team by providing supervision and mentorship, while interviewing and hiring new team members.

We’d love to hear from you if:
You have 10+ years of experience in process engineering and automation in industry

You have experience in designing a high throughput lab automation platform for biologics discovery that is scalable for a growing company

You have an innovative vision for lab automation solutions that can help us grow over the course of 3-5 years and beyond

You have previous management or leadership experience including leading or working effectively with a cross functional group

You are a strategic thinker that can take broad visions and concepts and develop structured and innovative automation workflows

You have a working technical knowledge of laboratory automation equipment such as Tecan, Hamilton, Agilent, Perkin Elmer, or similar

You have experience working with laboratory automation consultants such as Thermo Fisher, BioSero, HighRes Biosolutions, or Strateos

You have a deep understanding of molecular biology or antibody biochemistry

You have project management experience

Offers & benefits:
The opportunity to work with an inspired team on challenging problems that matter

An attractive compensation package, including health and lifestyle benefits

A minimum of 4 weeks’ vacation

Opportunities for personal and professional development

About AbCellera:
At AbCellera, we find the next generation of therapeutic antibodies. To succeed, we have created innovative solutions at every step – custom antigen preparation and immunizations, microfluidics, high-throughput imaging, genomics, computation, machine learning and laboratory automation – leaving no stone unturned and revolutionizing how scientists can explore natural antibody diversity and the scale at which they can do it. You’ll join a diverse and multi-disciplinary team of biologists, biochemists, engineers, bioinformaticians, computer scientists and physicists – all working together to bring better therapies to patients. This is life-changing research and you could be a part of it.

We’re a growing company with state-of-the-art discovery tools and the drive to be the best in the industry. This isn’t just about having the best technology. We know we need a world-class team of innovators working together to solve the toughest problems. We look for people with drive and energy. Idealists. People we love and people we trust. This may be unconventional, but it is the key to our success. We’re looking for someone like you to support and organize our efforts along the way.

To apply:
Please submit your application through our website and refer to Job ID 21206 in your cover letter. We apologize in advance, but we receive a large volume of applications and are only able to contact those who are selected for an interview.