About Formation Bio
Formation Bio is a tech and AI driven pharma company differentiated by radically more efficient drug development.
Advancements in AI and drug discovery are creating more candidate drugs than the industry can progress because of the high cost and time of clinical trials. Recognizing that this development bottleneck may ultimately limit the number of new medicines that can reach patients, Formation Bio, founded in 2016 as TrialSpark Inc., has built technology platforms, processes, and capabilities to accelerate all aspects of drug development and clinical trials. Formation Bio partners, acquires, or in-licenses drugs from pharma companies, research organizations, and biotechs to develop programs past clinical proof of concept and beyond, ultimately helping to bring new medicines to patients. The company is backed by investors across pharma and tech, including a16z, Sequoia, Sanofi, Thrive Capital, John Doerr, Spark Capital, SV Angel Growth, and others.
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At Formation Bio, our values are the driving force behind our mission to revolutionize the pharma industry. Every team and individual at the company shares these same values, and every team and individual plays a key part in our mission to bring new treatments to patients faster and more efficiently.
About the Position
Formation Bio is hiring Product Leads to own major problem domains across our drug development platform - for example, how we evaluate and acquire drug assets, how we design and run clinical trials, or how we build regulatory submissions. You will report to the CTO.
This is a product leadership role, but not a traditional one. You won't be writing specs for engineers to build. You'll own a business domain: set the strategy, define what to build, lead a cross-functional team through delivery, and be measured on whether the work actually changes outcomes for the drug programs and business functions you serve. Your team will include engineers, data scientists, and product managers (ranging from senior ICs to managers).
You will be embedded with our clinical, translational, regulatory, and business development leaders - understanding their problems deeply enough to identify where technology can make a material difference. That means learning what makes a drug asset attractive, what drives a trial design decision, what the FDA cares about, and where the real time and cost sinks are. You should be able to drive value in a clinical review meeting in the same way you drive value in a sprint planning session.
We are not building consumer software. We are building tools, models, and systems that make specific drug development decisions faster and better - prediction models that assess drug candidate viability, AI-driven workflows that compress diligence timelines, and platforms that let non-engineers build their own analytical tools. You will own a slice of that work and be accountable for its impact.
Responsibilities
- Own the product strategy for a defined problem domain (e.g., drug candidate evaluation, clinical trial execution, regulatory intelligence). Define what to build, what to deprioritize, and how to measure success.
- Drive adoption of AI across your domain. We use LLMs, agentic workflows, and autonomous systems extensively. You should be pushing what's possible, not waiting for the technology teams to propose it.
- Design systems that domain experts across the company can build on directly. Non-engineers are already creating their own technology - your solutions should accelerate that, not bottleneck it.
- Lead a cross-functional team spanning engineering, data science, and product. Set the roadmap and make resourcing trade-offs based on business impact.
- Work directly with our core functional teams as a strategic tech partner. Translate their problems into technology solutions - not by taking feature requests, but by understanding the domain well enough to see opportunities they may not.
- Guide the data science and engineering approach within your domain, including real-world evidence analysis, prediction pipelines, clinical strategies, and dataset evaluation. You need enough technical judgment to know when an approach is sound and when to push back.
- Maintain awareness of regulatory constraints. You don't need to be a regulatory expert, but you need to build products that work within GxP requirements and clinical data governance standards.
About You
- 10+ years of experience in tech delivery with progressively broader scope, including at least one role where you led product or technology strategy and were held accountable for business outcomes.
- Life sciences experience: You've built products in biotech, pharma, or a related industry. You understand the drug development lifecycle well enough to have informed opinions about where technology does and doesn't help. You've worked in an environment shaped by regulatory constraints and scientific uncertainty.
- Strategic product thinker: You define product direction based on business outcomes, not feature velocity. You've owned a product area where success was measured in terms the business cared about - time saved, decisions improved, cost reduced - not just user engagement or ship rate.
- AI fluency: You can evaluate AI/ML approaches, make build-vs-buy decisions on AI capabilities, and push your team to use AI where it creates real leverage. You've deployed or led the deployment of LLM-based or agentic systems in a professional context.
- Technical fluency: You can engage deeply with engineers and data scientists on approach, architecture, and trade-offs. You can evaluate whether an ML model is solving the right problem, whether a data pipeline is reliable enough, and whether an engineering approach will scale.
- Cross-functional leadership: You've led teams that included engineers, data scientists, and product managers. You know how to hire, develop, and hold people to high standards.
- Business fluency: You can discuss clinical trial design, asset valuation, regulatory strategy, and competitive dynamics with senior leaders without retreating to technical jargon. You've been in rooms where the conversation was about business decisions, not product decisions, and you contributed.
- Comfortable with ambiguity and autonomy: You are highly adaptable and curious. You've worked in early-stage companies, on transformation efforts or new initiatives where the scope was unclear and the playbook didn't exist. That energizes you rather than stalls you.
- Mission-driven: You care about getting medicines to patients faster. That's what this company exists to do, and it matters to you.
Total Compensation Range: Senior Director: $270,000-$353,000; Vice President: $374,000 - $467,000
Compensation Individual compensation is determined by several factors, including role scope, geographic location, and skills & experience. Your offer will reflect where you fall within the range based on these considerations. In addition to base salary, we offer equity, comprehensive benefits, and generous perks. If the posted range doesn't match your expectations, we still encourage you to apply!
Where We Hire Formation Bio is prioritizing hiring in key hubs, primarily the New York City and Boston metro areas, with a hybrid model requiring 3 days per week in office. Applicants from the Research Triangle (NC) and San Francisco Bay Area may also be considered. Please apply only if you reside in these locations or are willing to relocate.
Equal Opportunity Formation Bio is committed to building a diverse and inclusive team. We are an equal opportunity employer and welcome candidates from all backgrounds. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, creed, religion, national origin, ancestry, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, breastfeeding, and related medical conditions), gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, age, disability, genetic information, marital status, military or veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state, or local law.