Principal Data Engineer, Platform

🚀 About Lila Sciences

Lila Sciences is the world’s first scientific superintelligence platform and autonomous lab for life, chemistry, and materials science.  We are pioneering a new age of boundless discovery by building the capabilities to apply AI to every aspect of the scientific method.  We are introducing scientific superintelligence to solve humankind's greatest challenges, enabling scientists to bring forth solutions in human health, climate, and sustainability at a pace and scale never experienced before. Learn more about this mission at  www.lila.ai    

At Lila, we are uniquely cross-functional and collaborative. We are actively reimagining the way teams work together and communicate. Therefore, we seek individuals with an inclusive mindset and a diversity of thought. Our teams thrive in unstructured and creative environments. All voices are heard because we know that experience comes in many forms, skills are transferable, and passion goes a long way.

If this sounds like an environment you’d love to work in, even if you only have some of the experience listed below, please apply.

🌟 Your Impact at Lila

As the Principal Data Engineer, you will be the technical leader of our data storage strategy. You will work as a member of the platform team to design and implement a system that efficiently stores, organizes, and retrieves complex datasets from various sources (e.g., laboratory instruments, simulations, ML systems). You will also set the direction for data infrastructure best practices, ensuring security, compliance, and top-tier performance. Your work will enable engineers and scientists to leverage high-quality, curated data to drive scientific discoveries and real-world applications. 

🛠️ What You'll Be Building

1. Design and implement a scalable data lake and/or data warehouse architecture optimized for large volumes of heterogeneous scientific data.  
2. Drive optimizations for query performance and data retrieval, reducing time to insight for end-users and downstream systems.
3. Implement data governance processes, including data cataloging, lineage, and quality controls.
4. Participate in the software development life cycle and drive continuous improvement, focusing on designing, implementing, and maintaining software services.  
5. Develop reusable code, libraries, APIs, and services to improve efficiency and scalability.
6. Align development with strategic goals, ensuring software supports broader organizational needs.
7. Manage git repositories and CI/CD pipelines, enforce best practices, and foster a collaborative development culture.
8. Support infrastructure as code and design efficient deployment strategies.
9. Utilize observability tooling to monitor and optimize software performance.
10. Write clear, concise documentation for both engineers and end users. 

🧰 What You’ll Need to Succeed

1. Minimum of 5 years of experience managing data systems in a production setting. 
2. Python coding experience in the data domain.
3. Acute listening skills and patience to deeply understand user challenges.
4. Experience implementing petabyte scale data solutions.
5. Excellent problem-solving skills and team-first mentality.  
6. Strong communication skills to effectively collaborate with team members and stakeholders across different data domains.
7. Energetic self-starter and independent thinker, with strong attention to detail.
8. Eager to work with highly skilled and dynamic teams in a fast-paced, entrepreneurial, and technical setting. 

✨ Bonus Points For

1. Experience with workflow orchestration software (e.g., Temporal, Airflow, Dagster, Prefect). 
2. Familiarity with data science and ML libraries (pandas, numpy, scipy).
3. Knowledge of modern developer tools (pydantic, pyright, uv, poetry).
4. Experience working in Kubernetes environments.
5. Familiarity with AWS services (e.g., IAM, RDS, S3, Redshift). 

🌈 We’re All In

Lila Sciences is committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, gender identity or Veteran status.

🤝 A Note to Agencies

Lila Sciences does not accept unsolicited resumes from any source other than candidates. The submission of unsolicited resumes by recruitment or staffing agencies to Lila Sciences or its employees is strictly prohibited unless contacted directly by Lila Science’s internal Talent Acquisition team. Any resume submitted by an agency in the absence of a signed agreement will automatically become the property of Lila Sciences, and Lila Sciences will not owe any referral or other fees with respect thereto.