Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning (AI/ML) Capability Engineering Team Lead

Description

The company is hiring a team lead for its AI/ML capability engineering group. You will supervise a cross-functional team of AI/ML engineers and data scientists building natural language processing (NLP) and agentic AI capabilities for therapeutic research and development.

You will work with partners across the R&D pipeline and the software stack to start AI initiatives, shape AI strategy, and lead a team of skilled people. The models and pipelines your team builds are meant to address real problems and improve patient outcomes.

Responsibilities

• Build, deploy, and publish AI methods and agentic workflows for areas such as AI machine translation, content generation and document drafting, workflow optimization, large-scale data enrichment, literature mining, target and biomarker prioritization, and representation learning such as molecular design.
• Work with stakeholders and product teams to generate ideas, design solutions, build them, and improve them over time.
• Evaluate and optimize machine learning and AI workflows with standard and new techniques, and develop human-in-the-loop approaches.
• Propose focus areas and solutions for the team to explore.
• Work across the R&D pipeline and across informatics and AI/ML disciplines, including image processing, bioinformatics, representation learning, and decision sciences.
• Track the evolving AI regulations and internal policies, including those on data privacy and risk mitigation, and help the team follow them.
• Keep up with new developments in AI/ML and agentic AI.
• Use AI coding assistants in creative and responsible ways.
• Present plans and results to scientific and IT leadership and advise on strategic planning.
• Supervise, mentor, and recruit AI/ML engineers and other team members.

Requirements

• Strong technical and non-technical communication, planning, teamwork, and leadership skills.
• Ability to assess new problems critically, and to design and implement AI/ML solutions.
• Strategic thinking, including the ability to see how AI/ML and software solutions could apply to new areas.
• Solid understanding of modern LLM and agentic architectures, including retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), tool calling and Model Context Protocol (MCP), structured extraction, and agent orchestration.
• Fluency in Python, Git, environment management (e.g., uv, Docker), and at least one ML framework (e.g., PyTorch, vLLM).
• Strong statistical analysis skills, including an understanding of how class imbalance affects results.
• Experience with scalable engineering frameworks such as Apache Spark and orchestration frameworks such as Airflow.
• Experience with agentic AI protocols and standards such as MCP, A2A, and A2UI, and with building production-ready software and AI solutions.
• Experience with harness optimization approaches (e.g., auto-research).
• Experience deploying and operating AI/ML models, and with modern software deployment practices such as DevOps and CI/CD.
• Experience with agentic system development (e.g., LangGraph), text processing (e.g., regular expressions, information retrieval, search systems), semantic engineering (e.g., RDF), or data engineering.
• Familiarity with enterprise AI governance, data privacy boundaries, validation, fairness, and related ethical AI topics.
• A passion for technology, science, biomedicine, and mentoring.
• Minimum: a PhD in data science, AI/ML/LLM or agentic systems engineering, computer science, semantic engineering, a related discipline, or a scientific field, plus 5 years of relevant industry experience; or an M.S. in a similar field plus 6 years of relevant industry experience; or a B.S. in a similar field plus 7 years of relevant industry experience.
• Minimum: 5 years of technical leadership experience on AI/ML, NLP, or agentic AI projects or products.
• Minimum: 2 years of experience supervising team members.
• Required skills: Apache Airflow, Apache Spark, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Data Engineering, Git, IBM watsonx.governance, Image Processing, LangGraph, Machine Learning (ML), Natural Language Processing (NLP), Orchestrate, Python (Programming Language), Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC), Solution Architecture, System Designs, System Integration, Systems Engineering, Testing.

Conditions

Location: Rahway, New Jersey, USA. Hybrid work arrangement.

Employment type: regular.

Travel: up to 10%.

Relocation: domestic only.

Visa sponsorship: not offered.

Shift: not indicated.

Valid driver's license: not required.

Base salary range for the primary location: $173,200.00 to $272,600.00. Placement in the range depends on factors such as education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, geographic location, government requirements, and business needs.

Equal-opportunity and accommodation statements apply as described in the full posting.

Applications close on 11/14/2026; the posting is open through 11:59:59 PM on the day before that date.

Benefits

• Eligibility for an annual bonus and long-term incentive, where applicable.
• Medical, dental, and vision coverage, plus other insurance for employees and families.
• Retirement plan including a 401(k).
• Paid holidays, vacation, and compassionate and sick leave.