Director, Cardiometabolic Diseases and Obesity - Target Validation

About Us

Valo Health is a technology company that is integrating human-centric data and AI-powered technology to accelerate the creation of life-changing drugs for more patients faster. Valo was created with the belief that the drug discovery and development process can and should be faster and less expensive, with a much higher probability of success. We are using models early to fail less often, executing clinical trials to add valuation to the company, and generating fit-for-purpose data to feed back into Valo’s Opal Computational Platform™ as we reinvent drug discovery and development from the ground up. Disease doesn’t wait, so neither can we.

We are a multi-disciplinary team of experts in science, technology, and pharmaceuticals united in our mission to achieve better drugs for patients faster. Valo is committed to hiring diverse talent, prioritizing growth and development, fostering an inclusive environment, and creating opportunities to bring together a group of different experiences, backgrounds, and voices to work together. We achieve the widest-ranging impact when we leverage our broad backgrounds and perspectives to accelerate a new frontier in health. Valo seeks to become the catalyst for the pharmaceutical industry and drive the digital transformation of the industry. Are you ready to join us?

About the Role...

Valo is looking for a Director to play a pivotal role in building strategies for validation of drug targets for obesity, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases that have been identified using Valo’s human-centric Opal computational platform. This position requires deep expertise in metabolic disease including a background in at least one of the following organ systems: central regulation of obesity, skeletal muscle, adipose tissue, and/or liver. The ideal candidate must have a background in drug discovery and a passion for translating human data insights to develop new therapies for complex diseases. In this role, you will develop strategies using human cell assays to validate novel targets and lead drug discovery projects stemming from these target validation efforts. The person in this role will also be critical for leading project teams. As a project lead you will be responsible for coordinating the efforts of a small matrixed multi-functional team and be responsible in collaboration with your team for delivering validation data packages and presenting to internal and external stakeholders. You will closely collaborate with subject matter experts, computational scientists, and engineers. You will participate as a subject matter expert in the development of research hypotheses that will shape Valo’s target discovery strategy.

What You’ll Do…

• Develop strategies and platforms that may be used to validate novel targets.
• Serve as research project lead on various stage preclinical drug discovery projects.
• Provide thought leadership and guidance on obesity, T2D, and/or cardiovascular disease biology, staying abreast of emerging trends and advancements in the field.
• Generate hypothesis-driven experimental plans and proposals for target validation in close collaboration with data scientists and other subject matter experts to enable crisp decision making.
• Manage scientists and teams in a matrixed manner to ensure high quality data generation and timely delivery of key readouts supporting team goals.
• Design experiments to coordinate and manage with CROs.
• Work in collaboration with Valo’s tissue and cell model experts to support target validation projects as well as ongoing drug discovery projects.

What You Bring…

• A PhD in Biological Sciences or a related field with 10+ years of experience (may include postdoctoral experience, or MS with 14+ years or BS with 16+ years) and deep expertise in one or more of the following areas: obesity, diabetes, skeletal muscle, adipose tissue, liver.
• Expertise in in vitro systems including cell culture, molecular biology, genetic manipulation, and development of functional assays.
• Experience leading early and established preclinical stage drug discovery programs.
• Experience managing and collaborating with teams and scientists in a matrixed fashion to produce high quality data.
• Track record of impactful scientific contributions as demonstrated by high impact publications and prior success in progressing programs through a therapeutic pipeline.
• Strong oral and written communication, presentation and interpersonal skills.

You May Also Bring…

• Experience working with external stakeholders collaboratively.
• Experience in in vivo/ex vivo systems.
• Experience in assessing novel biology and cellular systems to aid in drug discovery programs and de-risking novel target concepts.

More on Valo

Valo Health, LLC (“Valo”) is a technology company built to transform the drug discovery and development process using human-centric data and artificial intelligence-driven computation. As a digitally native company, Valo aims to fully integrate human-centric data across the entire drug development life cycle into a single unified architecture, thereby accelerating the discovery and development of life-changing drugs while simultaneously reducing costs, time, and failure rates. The company’s Opal Computational Platform™ is an integrated set of capabilities designed to transform data into valuable insights that may accelerate discoveries and enable Valo to advance a robust pipeline of programs across cardiovascular metabolic renal, oncology, and neurodegenerative diseases. Founded by Flagship Pioneering and headquartered in Lexington, MA. Valo also has offices in New York, NY. To learn more, visit www.valohealth.com.