Senior Manager, Sweetener Research Chemist

Senior Manager: Sweetener Research Chemist

Position Overview

The Principal Scientist for Sweetener Development is a highly talented expert with deep technical expertise in identifying and understanding sweeteners and other beverage ingredients. This role is crucial to the company’s sweetener and ingredient research pipeline, spearheading experimentation to discover, source, synthesize, and evaluate novel beverage ingredients for potential use in future beverage portfolios.

Serving as a key technical resource and subject matter expert within the company’s sweetener innovation program, this role demands a strong background in organic chemistry to aid in the discovery and development of new sweetening agents, taste modulators, and mouthfeel enhancers. The successful candidate will coordinate and lead the collection of sensory data, bio-based assay results, and physicochemical property data for candidate ingredients within the research pipeline. Utilizing their chemical expertise, the successful candidate will (1) facilitate the sourcing and custom synthesis of novel ingredient compounds within the research pipeline, (2) develop and interpret structure-activity relationships (SAR) from collected data, and (3) validate promising pipeline ingredients for their suitability in commercial beverage processes and applications to recommend potential ingredients for development and commercialization.

The successful candidate must execute priorities by collaborating externally with contract research organizations, university research groups, custom synthesis, and ingredient suppliers, and internally with stakeholders such as analytical chemistry, biology, data science, sensory, and application teams.

Key Duties/ Responsibilities

• Work as part of a team of scientists by leading and managing research projects within the sweetener innovation program to support discovery and development of new sweetener, taste modulating, and mouthfeel ingredients. 
• Lead internal and external teams of research scientists to acquire lead pipeline candidate compounds, validate the suitability of their properties, and recommend candidates for commercial ingredient development.
• Support the research pipeline by managing relationships and projects with 3rd party providers of custom synthesis, compound sourcing and sensory evaluation services.
• Support and coordinate data collection of pipeline candidate compounds, encompassing chemical analysis, bio-based assays, and human sensory evaluations.
• Work with the internal research team to interpret results for pipeline candidate compounds, identify leads, and develop improvements to the research pipeline.
• Manage the collection, recording and maintenance of data in electronic compound management database as well as manage compound sample libraries. Work closely with data scientists to manage data for predictive model development projects.
• Support internal sensory evaluation of novel ingredients by directing internal and external analytical teams to acquire purity results to support internal safety review processes.
• Manage relationships and projects with 3rd party providers of custom synthesis, compound sourcing and sensory evaluation services, analytical verification of identity and purity, and purification for internal safety review processes.
• Monitor and lead external technology evaluations for sweeteners and manage the relation with suppliers on new sweetener and ingredient technologies
• Monitor technical literature to understand IP landscape of related technical fields and identify future research opportunities, relevant external technologies and leverages to internal needs.

Education Requirements & Professional Experience:

• PHD in Organic Chemistry, Medicinal Chemistry, or a closely related field.
• 5+ years of industry experience, preferable in food ingredient research and commercial food and beverage production processes.
• Working experience with chemical and biosynthesis to support synthesis is required.
• Experience with capturing and filing IP is required.
• Proven track record of successful new ingredient or compound discovery and development, experiences with food ingredients / sweetener application is a plus.
• Strong understanding of analytical techniques and physicochemical properties is required.  Experience with food ingredient regulations and identifying minor components related to food and beverage ingredient is advantageous.
• Working experience with structure-activity relationships (SAR) is advantageous.

Functional Skills:

• Be a global thought leader, subject matter expert and influencer internally and externally in the area of sweetener and ingredient development, scale up and commercialization
• Ability to lead and integrate internal and external resources to drive technical projects
• Ability to translate science and technology to projects that deliver business results
• Ability to build business case and build technology platforms to drive business growth, work with internal partners and network across operating units to identify and deliver high business impact from long term research initiatives

Communication and Leadership Skills:

• Communication: The successful candidate will have effective written and oral communication skills with the ability to communicate complex technical concepts to technical and non-technical audiences including Senior Management.
• Strategic Thinking: Must be able to view situation holistically and make decisions that balance short-term needs and long-term strategic objectives.
• Influencing: Strong influencing skills, with a demonstrated ability to influence strategies and research directions both within the company and in the industry.
• Delivering Results: Must be self-motivated and have ability to effectively focus and motivate resources from your own team as well as cross functional resources within the larger Innovation and Technical teams.
• Learning Agility: Ability to rapidly study, analyze, and apply new technologies. Ability and willingness to learn from experience
   

Growth Behavior: Must demonstrate all growth behaviors