Founding Scientist / Co-Founder

ABOUT THE ROLE This is a rare opportunity to join as a Founding Scientist / Co-Founder at an early-stage startup at the intersection of AI and wet-lab biology, operating within the aerospace and defense sector. You will combine hands-on biological expertise with computational thinking to shape the company's scientific strategy and core technology — bridging laboratory work with AI-driven workflows to accelerate discovery. This role is on-site in Germany. Candidates must be eligible to work in Germany without visa sponsorship. WHAT YOU'LL DO - Define and lead the scientific vision and research roadmap for early-stage AI + wet-lab products. - Design and execute key experiments in molecular biology, biochemistry, or genomics to validate models and assays. - Collaborate closely with engineers and ML researchers to translate experimental needs into computational requirements. - Implement and oversee lab automation and data pipelines to scale experiments and improve reproducibility. - Prototype computational tools and analyses; contribute code or notebooks integrating wet-lab data with models. - Mentor and recruit early scientific hires; establish laboratory best practices and safety standards. - Help navigate sector-specific constraints unique to aerospace and defense applications. WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR Required: - PhD in Biotechnology, Genomics, Biology, or a closely related field. - Senior-level research experience in molecular biology, biochemistry, genomics, biotech, or equivalent industry background. - Demonstrated experience applying AI/ML to biological data (computational biology, bioinformatics, or similar). - Experience in or familiarity with aerospace or defense domains, including an understanding of sector-specific constraints. - Comfortable with computational thinking and coding; experience with ML is a strong plus. - Must be eligible to work in Germany without visa sponsorship. Nice to Have: - Prior experience at AI-for-biology companies, biotech startups, or similar industry environments. - Hands-on lab automation experience. - Prior founder experience or direct experience scaling early-stage teams and operations. - Entrepreneurial mindset with comfort navigating ambiguity in a fast-moving startup environment. - Strong cross-functional communication and collaboration skills. Ideal Background: Research or training at a leading institution or university, with a track record that combines rigorous wet-lab science and computational fluency. Candidates with backgrounds at defense-adjacent biotech firms or aerospace technology companies are particularly well-suited. WHAT YOU'LL BE BUILDING You will work at the frontier of AI-accelerated biology, helping to build systems that tightly integrate machine learning models with experimental wet-lab workflows. The team values intellectual curiosity, a bias toward action, and the ability to move fluidly between the bench and the codebase. LOCATION & WORK ARRANGEMENT - Location: Germany (on-site) - Remote: Not available for this role - Visa Sponsorship: Not available — candidates must have existing eligibility to work in Germany