Principal/Senior Principal Software Engineer, Solutions

A healthier future. It’s what drives us to innovate. To continuously advance science and ensure everyone has access to the healthcare they need today and for generations to come. Creating a world where we all have more time with the people we love. That’s what makes us Roche.

Advances in AI, data and computational sciences are transforming drug discovery and development. Roche’s Research and Early Development organizations at Genentech (gRED) and Pharma (pRED) have demonstrated how these technologies accelerate R&D, leveraging data and novel computational models to drive impact. Seamless data sharing and access to models across gRED and pRED are essential to maximising these opportunities. The Computational Sciences Center of Excellence (CS CoE) is a strategic, unified group whose goal is to harness the transformative  power of data and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to assist our scientists in both pRED and gRED to deliver more innovative and life-changing  medicines for patients worldwide.

Within the CS CoE organisation, the Data and Digital Catalyst (DDC) organization leads the modernization of our computational and data ecosystems by integrating digital technologies across Research and Early Development to empower stakeholders, advance data-driven science and accelerate decision-making.

The Solutions team within the DDC Organization develops modernized and interconnected computational and data ecosystems. The Data Ecosystem is foundational to building solutions that accelerate the work done by our Computational and Bench Scientists and enable ML/AI tool creation and adoption. Our team specializes in building Data Pipelines and Applications for data acquisition, collection, storage, transformation, linkage and sharing. 

As a Software Engineer in the Solutions Engineering capability, you will work closely with colleagues such as Data Engineers, Product Leaders, and Tech/ML Ops as well as directly with our key partners including Computational Scientists and Research Scientists. You'll build robust and scalable systems that unlock the potential of our diverse scientific data, accelerating the discovery and development of life-changing treatments for patients. As part of this role, you’ll contribute to building a modern, scalable and robust ecosystem of applications, agents and other tools to capture, move and prepare the scientific data for analysis.

You are passionate about building scalable, reliable, and reusable capabilities for our shared platform. As a software engineer with strong experience in backend and/or frontend development, you design and implement components with scalability and reliability at their core. You bring hands-on expertise in cloud technologies and follow engineering best practices—including code reviews, unit testing, and adherence to coding standards—while boosting productivity through AI-powered development tools and environments.

Ideally, you are a full-stack software engineer or data engineer with domain knowledge in biology, chemistry, drug discovery, translational medicine, or a related scientific discipline. You thrive on leveraging platform components to build common solutions, and you excel at engaging with scientific stakeholders to understand their challenges and translate them into effective technology solutions in close collaboration with Product and Engineering teams.

The Opportunity:

• Proven track record of leading and delivering complex, user-friendly projects and tools in a fast-paced environment

• Strategic/Tactical Technical leadership for the ongoing initiatives and by identifying new opportunities with an eye for consolidation, deprecation and building common solutions

• Responsible for technical excellence and ensuring our solutions and capabilities are innovative, best-in-class and integrated by delivering data flows and pipelines within and across DDC and key domains like Research Biology, Drug Discovery, Translational Medicine and Development and more

• Learn, deeply understand and improve our Data Workflows, Application Architecture and Data Ecosystem by leveraging standard patterns like layered architecture, microservices, event-driven, multi-tenancy, etc.

• Responsible for ensuring our technical choices are innovative, best-in-class and are inter-operable and consistent across DDC and domains like Research Biology, Drug Discovery, Translational Medicine and Development and more

• Understand and influence technical decisions around data workflows and application development while working collaboratively with our key partners 

• Integrate diverse sets of data together to power  AI/ML and Natural Language Search, as well as enable  our downstream teams working on Workflows, Visualization and Analytics

• Facilitate the implementation of AI models that take advantage of advances in machine learning and artificial intelligence

Who You Are: 

• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science or similar technical field, or equivalent experience and 7+ years of experience in software engineering (Principal Software Engineer); 12+ years of experience (Sr. Principal Software Engineer)

• Deep experience and technical understanding of modern web application development, platforms and data engineering approaches, including data flow within the cloud and cutting-edge data storage solutions

• Deep experience in full stack development is required.  You have strong skills building Front Ends using JavaScript, React  or similar Libraries as well as Backends using high level languages like Python or Java 

• Extensive experience working with Databases, Data Analytics (SQL/NoSQL, ETL, ELT) and APIs (REST, GraphQL) is preferred

• Extensive experience working on cloud-native architectures in public clouds (ideally AWS) is preferred

• Experience with building Designs for Data Applications which are highly reliable, scalable, performant, secure and robust and ideally on a public cloud platform

• Adopts and champions an Open Source, Cloud First, API First and AI First approach to problem-solving by identifying key trends, leveraging cutting-edge technologies and influencing their adoption to deliver innovative solutions

• Ability to think strategically and optimize for the long term while acting with a sense of urgency

• Provide technical mentorship and leadership to junior developers, fostering professional growth and taking accountability for upholding high coding standards

• Outstanding communication skills, capable of articulating technical concepts clearly to diverse audiences, including executives and  globally distributed technical teams, ensuring effective collaboration and understanding

• Experience reducing Tech Debt and consolidating and deprecating legacy solutions

• Experience in integrating AI into applications and development practices is a plus

Onsite presence, on our South San Francisco campus, is expected for at least 3 days a week.

Relocation benefits are available for this job posting.

The expected salary range for this position based on the primary location of California is $162,600 - $302,000 (Principal Software Engineer) and $189,200 - $351,400  (Senior Principal Software Engineer) .  Actual pay will be determined based on experience, qualifications, geographic location, and other job-related factors permitted by law.  A discretionary annual bonus may be available based on individual and Company performance.  This position also qualifies for the benefits detailed at the link provided below.

Benefits

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Genentech is an equal opportunity employer. It is our policy and practice to employ, promote, and otherwise treat any and all employees and applicants on the basis of merit, qualifications, and competence. The company's policy prohibits unlawful discrimination, including but not limited to, discrimination on the basis of Protected Veteran status, individuals with disabilities status, and consistent with all federal, state, or local laws.

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