Director of Engineering, 23andMe

Machine Learning

$240-360k

AWS
Python
Pandas
PyTorch
Sagemaker
Senior and Expert level
San Francisco Bay Area

2+ days a week in office (Sunnyvale, CA)

23andMe

Genetic testing and DNA analysis

Open for applications

23andMe

Genetic testing and DNA analysis

501-1000 employees

HealthcareB2CPersonal healthBiology

Open for applications

$240-360k

AWS
Python
Pandas
PyTorch
Sagemaker
Senior and Expert level
San Francisco Bay Area

2+ days a week in office (Sunnyvale, CA)

501-1000 employees

HealthcareB2CPersonal healthBiology

Company mission

To help people access, understand, and benefit from the human genome.

Role

Who you are

  • Minimum of 8 years of experience in an engineering role, at least 4 of which are in a management role
  • BS or MS in Computer Science or related technical field
  • A strong philosophy of iterative development, seeking feedback from stakeholders, resisting upfront over-engineering or scope creep, and a willingness to change direction
  • Experience with building and maintaining critical production systems with uptime requirements, on call rotations, and emergency response
  • Experience collaborating with scientists and researchers and a passion for enabling and accelerating their work
  • Familiarity with state of the art machine learning infrastructure-as-a-service such as AWS Sagemaker and/or pipeline tools such as MLFlow and MetaFlow
  • Proficiency with Python and related scientific libraries (numba, pandas, pytorch)
  • Exceptional, multidisciplinary communication skills and a strong curiosity to learn about complex biological topics; we are solving some of the hardest problems in science, today

What the job involves

  • In this role, you’ll be leading the development of our machine learning infrastructure: the backbone of every scientific feature 23andMe delivers
  • We are in the business of contextualizing genetic ancestry, predicting health outcomes and helping customers live longer lives through personalized insights from their data. You’ll work with a multidisciplinary team of scientists, engineers, and physicians to create the next generation of genetics-based health applications
  • Direct multiple teams of senior engineers with responsibility over production-critical services
  • Leverage modern AI/ML technologies like transformer networks to solve sequence-based biological puzzles
  • Build the world’s best performing predictive models by training them on the world’s largest genotype-phenotype database
  • Collaborate with data scientists and researchers to build internal infrastructure and services, improving their productivity through self-serve tooling and direct support
  • Coordinate with product managers on requirements, scope, and timelines for development
  • Define success metrics, key results, and inspire your team to go beyond code and solve business-critical problems

Our take

23andMe offers its customers a vision into their ancestry and health through genetic testing carried out via kits sent through the mail. Results can show users their risk of more than 50 health conditions thanks to a tube of saliva at one end and a lot of technology at the other.

This access to genetic insight has helped the company sell more than 15 million test kits in the last 15 years. This remains the core component of the business. Access to millions of customers DNA however has given the company a vast collection of genetic material, allowing 23andMe to expanded into the drug development space where it is collaborating with pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline.

23andMe is not without competition, with other big names including Ancestry and MyHeritage. However, with a valuation of $3.5 billion, it remains one of the largest, with pockets deep enough to pursue many of its growth programs. In mid-2021, the company went public through a SPAC merger with a company founded by Richard Branson. 23andMe intends to use the merger to invest in its health and therapeutics division.

Kirsty headshot

Kirsty

Company Specialist

Insights

Led by a woman
Top investors

Few candidates hear
back within 2 weeks

10% employee growth in 12 months

Company

Funding (last 2 of 10 rounds)

Dec 2020

$82.5m

SERIES F

Jul 2018

$300m

GROWTH EQUITY VC

Total funding: $802.9m

Company benefits

  • Comprehensive health, vision, and dental plans
  • Family planning, support, and leave for parents
  • Mental healthcare
  • Student loan assistance
  • Volunteer time off
  • Dog friendly office

Company values

  • Think big - We are a mission-driven company with big dreams of using data to revolutionize health, wellness, and research
  • We heart DNA - Deciphering the human genome is the most exciting scientific discovery of our lifetime
  • Lead with science - We make evidence-based decisions and use data to better understand wellness and improve disease
  • Get to yes or no, quickly - Pioneering often means there is not an obvious path forward, but we also recognize that indecision leads to failure
  • Behind every data point is a human being - In each drop of spit lies a whole story of ancestry, health & connectedness
  • We’re in this together - Diversity and opportunity matter – we know that great ideas come from everywhere and that everyone contributes to our success

Company HQ

Sunnyvale, CA

Leadership

They studied Biology at Yale before working as a Healthcare Analyst for Investor AB, Ardsley Partners, Andor Capital, and Passport Capital for a combined 7 years. They leveraged this clinical experience to found 23andMe in 2006.

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