Founding Head of Strategy & Partnerships

We are seeking a Founding Head of Strategy & Partnerships to build and lead our commercial and data engine. We have validated science, robust IP, and active pharma partnerships. Now we need a commercial leader to translate our foundational technology into scalable, high-value partnerships — and, just as importantly, into a defensible data moat.

As a founding-team member, you will own our commercial and data strategy end-to-end, working directly with the CEO to define market positioning, generate and acquire the data that powers our models, structure partnerships with pharma and biotech customers, and close revenue-generating deals.

What you'll do

• Data strategy & generation: Define and execute our data acquisition and generation roadmap. Source, structure, and close partnerships with academia, hospitals, academic medical centers, CROs, and pharma to generate the perturbation, patient, and multi-modal data that compound our model advantage. Evaluate opportunities like in vivo and ex vivo perturbation data, patient tumor data, and retrospective pharma datasets, and decide which modalities drive the highest commercial and scientific value.
• Pharma & biotech BD: Build the pipeline, structure deals, and close contracts with pharma drug discovery and translational medicine teams. Drive active conversations with top 10 pharma toward signed, revenue-generating partnerships.
• Partnership sourcing: Establish academic collaborations, consortium participation, data-sharing agreements, and strategic partnerships with compute providers and model vendors.
• Commercial strategy & positioning: Define our pricing, packaging, and business model (e.g., API, services, platform license, or data co-development). Maintain sharp market intelligence to differentiate CellType from competitors.
• Fundraising support: Partner with the founding team to shape the fundraising narrative, manage investor diligence, and articulate our commercial and data traction to top-tier VCs.

You may be a fit if you

• Bring deep industry background in pharma and biotech, with a strong perspective on the intersection of AI, biology, and data
• Have experience in pharma BD / alliance management, closing platform, data, or methodology deals at major pharma and biotech companies
• Have a track record of closing data-generation and data-access partnerships with hospitals, academic medical centers, CROs, or pharma
• Have tech-bio commercial leadership experience at a scaling platform company
• Have a background in biotech strategy consulting with significant client work in AI biotech or pharma R&D
• Have associate-to-principal level experience at top life sciences VC funds, ready to transition into an operating role
• Have a track record of closing deals and navigating complex diligence processes

Note: This role requires deep industry background; it is not a fit for generalist tech BD professionals or pure academics without commercial exposure.

What we offer

• $200K–$280K base salary commensurate with experience
• Meaningful founding-team equity (0.5–2.0%)
• Comprehensive health, dental, and 401(k) benefits
• A senior seat at the table for every major strategic decision
• Direct exposure to pharma executives, top-tier investors, and the Yale / Google DeepMind scientific networks

This role will directly shape the commercial trajectory of CellType. The right person will help determine not only how we position our technology, but how fast we can scale our partnerships, how aggressively we build our data moat, and how confidently we can build a generational company.

If you want to work on difficult commercial challenges with real scientific and industry consequences, we encourage you to apply. Please include a brief note in your application highlighting which of our core beliefs you most agree or disagree with, and why. We care more about your reasoning than the conclusion.