Senior Data Engineer, Drug Discovery Data Engineering

Location: South San Francisco, CA

Department: COMPUTING

Who We Are:

Calico (Calico Life Sciences LLC) is an Alphabet-founded research and development company whose mission is to harness advanced technologies and model systems to increase our understanding of the biology that controls human aging. Calico will use that knowledge to devise interventions that enable people to lead longer and healthier lives. Calico’s highly innovative technology labs, its commitment to curiosity-driven discovery science, and, with academic and industry partners, its vibrant drug-development pipeline, together create an inspiring and exciting place to catalyze and enable medical breakthroughs.

Position Description:

Calico is seeking a Senior Data Engineer to join our highly collaborative Engineering team as the founding member of the Drug Discovery Data Engineering group. To succeed, you will need to be an enthusiastic team player, detail-oriented, extremely organized, and comfortable working on complex data, software, and scientific problems.

In this position, you will act as a technical bridge between our Medicinal Chemistry, Automation, Machine Learning, Assay Technology, and Protein Sciences groups. You will drive projects from requirements-gathering to production deployment, engineering high-performance data systems that integrate with our molecular databases (CDD Vault), inventory systems (Mosaic), electronic lab notebooks (Benchling), our internal data warehouse (BigQuery), and our internally developed AI platform. As the first hire on this team, you will play a pivotal role in defining data flows, building web applications for stakeholder review, and establishing the engineering culture for this important growth area.

Position Responsibilities:

• End-to-End Project Ownership: Collaborating with scientists in Assay Technology, Medicinal Chemistry, and Protein Sciences to gather requirements, architect solutions, and deploy production-grade software that facilitates data movement and analysis
• System Integration: Designing and implementing robust integrations between internal pipelines and third-party platforms, specifically the CDD molecular database, Mosaic inventory systems, and Benchling ELN
• Data Flow Architecture: Defining and optimizing data flows across the organization (e.g., ensuring seamless data handover from Machine Learning -> Protein Sciences -> Assay Technologies) to accelerate the drug discovery feedback loop
• Full-Stack Tool Development: Developing data systems and internal web applications (using React and Python) that allow stakeholders to review, visualize, and communicate complex scientific data
• Mentorship & Leadership: Serving as a senior technical voice within a larger Engineering team; providing mentorship to junior engineers across Calico and helping onboard future hires into the Drug Discovery Data Engineering team
• Engineering Excellence: Championing best practices for infrastructure-as-code, CI/CD, and containerization while helping to set standards for data engineering at Calico

Position Requirements:

• BS/MS/PhD in Computer Science, Data Science, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience
• 5+ years of professional software or data engineering experience on the small molecule and antibody informatics side of pharmaceutical R&D
• Proficiency in applying laboratory informatics systems such as CDD Vault, Titian Mosaic, and Benchling to the drug discovery process
• Fluency in Python with a strong grasp of software and data engineering principles (testing, modularity, design patterns, data modeling)
• Demonstrated experience developing and deploying cloud-based applications on Google Cloud Platform (GCP) (preferred), AWS, or Azure
• Strong experience with modern web frameworks and infrastructure, specifically FastAPI, React, Kubernetes, and Terraform
• Proven ability to lead complex projects involving diverse stakeholders (e.g. both bench scientists and Machine Learning engineers) from concept to production
• Experience enforcing robust data governance policies and compliance with internal information security standards and best practices
• Must be willing to work onsite at least four days per week

Nice to Have:

• Experience working with large-scale biological or chemical datasets, including chemical and biological ontologies
• Prior experience managing external partnerships and vendors in the informatics space
• Experience with system administration of informatics platforms, including setting information security standards and negotiation of software contracts

The estimated base salary range for this role is $217,000 - $229,000. Actual pay will be based on a number of factors including experience and qualifications. This position is also eligible for two annual cash bonuses.