Senior Specialist - Operational Technology (OT) Research Infrastructure

Job Description

Our RaDS IT Research Infrastructure Product Line (RIPL) engineering team is seeking a Senior Specialist - Research Automation OT Infrastructure. This position will be a member of the Research Automation Operations product (Laboratory and Plant) within RIPL.  As Sr. OT Infrastructure Specialist, you will lead the definition and implementation of high-level requirements, principles and models that guide solution decisions and provide the OT infrastructure “blueprint” for engineering / project teams to implement these solutions.  You will focus on analyzing, designing, and developing solutions and implementation plans based on a current versus future state solution and reference architectures that aligns to business needs in the OT Pilot Plant space.  Your infrastructure experience in screening plant automation and system integration will contribute to building new platforms, enhancing existing ones for expansion, efficiency and productivity across drug discovery modalities and clinical phases. You will collaborate with multidisciplinary organizations in our Research and Development division and IT, including scientists, engineers, IT architects, infrastructure, quality, vendors in building, optimizing, and troubleshooting the OT automation systems.

The primary location of this position is Rahway, NJ or West Point, PA and will provide support services to other sites. Travel is expected to be around 10% if based from our Rahway office location. If based from our West Point, PA office, travel could be around 15%, depending on business needs.

Job Description          

• Commit to IT infrastructure optimization, prioritizes, and proposes opportunities for continuous improvement by identifying gaps, common trends and inefficiencies and help establish services where none exists.  Recommend obsolescence programs for the technology and infrastructure wherever possible.

• Technical experience in building and maintaining OT infrastructure for GMP manufacturing processes, secure networks compliant with ISA/IEC 62443 standards.

• Be the SME for our Shop Floor Network (Manufacturing division Core eventually migrated to Restricted LFN) firewall rules.  Be the point person for changes to these rules, and evaluation of impact to automation systems with IT driven firewall rule changes.

• Lead/assist project scopes, define IT and infrastructure deliverables, timelines and estimates for a wide array of technologies and deliver value-added IT services and infrastructure solutions while ensuring strategies to adapt to technological advancements.

• Collaborate closely with stakeholders and translate business needs into actionable requirements while acting as a conduit to development and infrastructure engineers.

• Contributes to the development of solution architectures in specific business, infrastructure, or functional areas. Identifies and evaluates alternative architectures and the trade-offs in cost, performance and scalability. Determines and documents architecturally significant decisions. Produces specifications of cloud-based or on-premises components, tiers and interfaces, for translation into detailed designs using selected services and products. Supports projects or change initiatives through the preparation of technical plans and application of design principles. Aligns solutions with enterprise and solution architecture standards (including security).

• Possess strong background in both technical and functional support. Can learn new concepts quickly and work independently with minimal oversight and collaborate with large groups while supporting applications and systems as well as analyzing and solving incidents, problems, identifying root causes and performing crisis management roles.

• Lead efforts to map and design operational service architecture maps for projects or change initiatives when designing IT/OT landscape

• Collaborate with our Research & Development Division scientists and engineers to identify research automation needs and define project requirements. 

• Collaborate with instrument vendors and suppliers to evaluate and implement new plant automation and manufacturing technologies.

• Ensure timely IT support in the joint investigation, diagnostics, and resolutions with our Research & Development Division scientists and engineers and interface with site and global functions such as infrastructure, engineering, system security, risk management, etc.

Education Requirement: 

• Bachelor’s degree in automation, engineering, computer science, or computer engineering related degree.

• Master’s degree is preferred.

Required Experience and Skills: 

• 5 years of experience on upstream m