VP, Platform Development and Operations

Company Summary:

Metaphore Biotechnologies, Inc. is a privately held biotechnology company building the next generation of biological therapeutics. Inspired by nature, our mission is to transform patient lives by unlocking the power of biological therapeutics with a new mimic-discovery platform.

Flagship Pioneering is a biotechnology company that invents and builds platform companies, each with the potential for multiple products that transform human health or sustainability. Since its launch in 2000, Flagship has originated and fostered more than 100 scientific ventures, resulting in more than $90 billion in aggregate value. Many of the companies Flagship has founded have addressed humanity’s most urgent challenges: vaccinating billions of people against COVID-19, curing intractable diseases, improving human health, preempting illness, and feeding the world by improving the resiliency and sustainability of agriculture.  Flagship has been recognized twice 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, and has been twice named to Fast Company’s annual list of the World’s Most Innovative Companies. Learn more about Flagship at www.flagshippioneering.com.

 

Position Summary:                                                               

Metaphore is seeking an entrepreneurial and strategic VP of Platform Operations and Development. In this role, you will be a critical part of Metaphore’s R&D Leadership Team, crafting a strategic vision and productizing workflows from lead optimization to preclinical development, touching all aspects of the company’s discovery and development activities. You will lead the platform operations team toward fulfilling the most impactful vision for Metaphore, accelerating and expanding the platform through innovation, strategic decision-making, and operational excellence. The ideal candidate will bring substantial experience in developing protein therapeutics, including monoclonal antibodies, from late-stage discovery through IND to clinical development. Strong leadership and team-building skills are essential, as are an innovative outlook and a propensity for leveraging novel technologies to generate new, transformative medicines.

 

Responsibilities:

• Bring operational excellence to a first-in-class platform poised to unlock the therapeutic potential of molecular mimicry
• Collaborate with the broader leadership team to develop the company’s scientific and product strategy for both value creation and sustainability impact
• Oversee the production and in-depth characterization and optimization of hits sourced from therapeutic programs, enabling the identification of lead candidates towards INDs
• Develop a strategy for the productization of workflows that integrate and fast follow high-throughput antibody discovery, enabling efficient therapeutic program parallelization

• Drive the development of scientific operations, drawing upon best-in-class laboratory automation technologies and workflow efficiency measures

• Collaborate closely with all teams to establish capabilities to produce comprehensive datasets covering drug substance development and animal modeling that optimally inform machine learning algorithm development
• Coordinate and manage hires across the platform operations team to support rigorous and efficient workflows while supporting an inclusive culture motivated by scientific novelty and patient impact
• Support the continued protection, creation, and expansion of the company’s intellectual property

• Manage uncertainty while maintaining an entrepreneurial technical environment

• Develop relationships with Flagship Pioneering’s broader scientific community
• Establish and oversee external projects and scientific collaborations

• Manage external relationships with contract research organizations

• Present to the company’s Board of Directors, Scientific Advisors, and external stakeholders 

Qualifications:

• 12+ years of R&D experience across biotech/pharma and academia, including leadership of mid to large-size R&D teams
• PhD or equivalent in pharmacology, molecular biolo