What if...

You could join an organization that creates, resources, and builds life sciences companies that invent breakthrough technologies in order to transform health care and sustainability?

Montai Health is a privately held, early-stage biotechnology company developing a platform for understanding and leveraging complex molecular interactions within organisms to solve global challenges in human health and sustainability. The company leverages a multidisciplinary approach that integrates tools ranging from machine learning and big data to multi-omics and high-throughput screening.

Who are we?

Montai Health was founded in Flagship Pioneering's venture creation engine has conceived and created companies such as Moderna Therapeutics (NASDAQ: MRNA), Editas Medicine (NASDAQ: EDIT), Omega Therapeutics (NASDAQ: OMGA), Seres Therapeutics (NASDAQ: MCRB), and Indigo Agriculture. Since its launch in 2000, Flagship has applied its unique hypothesis-driven innovation process to originate and foster more than 100 scientific ventures. In 2021, Flagship Pioneering was ranked 12th globally on Fortune's "Change the World" list, an annual ranking of companies that have made a positive social and environmental impact through activities that are part of their core business strategies..

At Montai, we nurture a bold, spirited and leading-edge culture dedicated to strengthening human health:

• We are one team with omnidirectional trust, empowered and accountable.
• We are strong as individuals but stronger as a team and we are committed to excellence.
• We have a sense of urgency and persistence and we are crazily confident that we can make a difference.
• We need to be comfortable with the uncomfortable and be rigorous and we recognize that failure is data.
• We care for diversity in people, thought, personality, opinions, background and distinctiveness.
• We have a sense of humor to help us manage through our strategic noise.

Job Description:

Montai is rapidly growing and seeking to add exceptional people to our multidisciplinary team. Montai is seeking to hire an experienced and motivated Head of In vitro biology/Platform to lead a growing scientific team and be responsible for managing medium-throughput workflows and establishing cell-based assays for the company. We are looking for an experienced scientific leader to work closely with Montai Senior Leadership to plan and direct new programs, from initial discovery efforts, through in vivo proof of concept, and, ultimately towards the clinic.

A successful candidate will focus on proposing, validating, and uncovering novel biological insights and molecular leads aided by the Montai Health computational discovery platform. The candidate will have broad areas of biological expertise and interests as Montai Health is focusing on a number of broad scientific areas including immunology and immune mediated diseases.

Key responsibilities include:

• Directing, establishing and designing in vitro cell based assays and screens to investigate target/pathway engagement and mechanistic action of therapeutic compounds on inflammatory and/or metabolic signaling pathways using human disease relevant cell-based models
• Developing a high-functioning team focused on medium throughput cell-based approaches.
• Leading, designing, and executing assay models. Defining assay parameters & optimizing protocols.
• Providing scientific leadership by coordinating activities with teams across different functional areas.
• Bringing a deep understanding of the drug discovery and development process.
• Extensive hands-on experience running small molecule, biological assays and cell-based screens.
• Managing screens and robotics & chemical libraries.
• Overseeing external research projects with vendors and CROs.
• Collaborating closely with multi-disciplinary team members across the entire organization.
• Hands-on supervision, leadership, and mentoring of research associates and junior scientists.
• Establishing strong scientific excellence and fostering an open culture of challenging assumptions, open scientific exchange, and deep scientific rigor.

Basic Qualifications:

• PhD. in immunology, cell biology, or related discipline, with 8+ years of industry research.
• 5 plus years of experience developing technology platforms for therapeutic programs.

• Deep expertise in inflammatory pathways driving various immune mediated disease areas
• Prior management and team building experience

Other Qualifications:

• Capable of both independent- and team-oriented work, collaborating across disciplines, and supervising and training junior research associates
• Experience with developing and/or implementing human cell-based assays to interrogate target engagement and biological readouts with emphasis on immunology, and/or pharmacology. Relevant industrial experience is a must
• Deep expertise and demonstrated expertise with cellular and biochemical assays and applications to medium throughput screening.
• Experience with high-throughput, automation, cell-based assays, such as plate-reader based assays
• Experience with molecular biology assays, such as real-time PCR, Western blot, ELISA
• Deep expertise with cellular and biochemical assays and applications to medium throughput screening.
• Experience with one or more -omics assays and experience building or running assays in support of omic data generation is strongly preferred.
• Deep understanding of general drug discovery process, from target identification and validation through regulatory filing, prior experience in driving programs to clinical development is strongly preferred
• Capable of managing multiple projects concurrently in a fast-paced work environment, highly motivated, strong work ethic
• Strong verbal, written communication, and problem-solving skills.

Personal Characteristics:

• Agility: Ability to work in a high energy organization with evolving goals and deliverables
• Results Oriented: Self-motivated, curious, accomplishes goals with minimal oversight
• Communication: Outstanding written and verbal communication skills, ability to work well with colleagues from diverse backgrounds and cultures
• Authenticity: Ability to voice their opinion and provide insight to the broader team, even when holding a minority or "out of the box" opinion. Ability to thrive with input from a cross-functional team while remaining the unquestioned scientific expert
• Team player: Desire to routinely interact with and mentor team members

Location: Cambridge, MA