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a16z Jobs · Jul 23, 2026

Ben Liu has raised $600M+ for his AI-native biopharma company - and he's hiring

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Katie Kirsch, David Booth, Erik Torenberg · a16z Jobs

Formation Bio is an AI-native biopharma company that’s raised more than $600M to bring new treatments to patients faster and more efficiently - and develop a pipeline of clinical-stage assets across a variety of therapeutic areas.

Advancements in AI and drug discovery are creating more candidate drugs than ever, but the industry can only progress a limited few due to the high cost and time of clinical trials. Formation Bio is fixing this bottleneck by building technology platforms, processes, and capabilities that accelerate all aspects of drug development and clinical trials.

The company is led by Ben Liu, a Rhodes Scholar with a PhD in Computational Biology who has spent his career deeply understanding the intersection between AI and drug development. He’s built a team dedicated to cultivating an AI-native culture and pursuing scientific depth. Team-members bring rigor to every experiment and discipline to every decision – respecting the complexity of biology while also pushing its boundaries.

Reimagining how medicines are developed isn’t easy. Formation Bio is taking on one of the world’s hardest and most important missions - and looking for people with ambition, curiosity, and conviction who can do it right. If you’re motivated by hard problems and lasting impact, Ben and his team would love to meet you.

Formation Bio is headquartered in NYC, with a second office in Boston and remote team-members in SF and North Carolina.

In no particular order.

  1. Director, Brand & Communications for up to $232K + equity. Own how the world hears about Formation Bio, across legacy & new media and among top talent and tastemakers across the bio and AI industries. Work directly with the co-founders on telling Formation Bio’s story in new, creative, enduring ways.

  2. Associate Director, Data Science for up to $267K + equity. Lead strategy and execution of Formation Bio’s real-world data capabilities, from sourcing through delivery. Build and maintain scalable data infra to produce quality data that the teams can trust when they’re deciding which drug assets to pursue.

  3. Data Scientist, Portfolio Optimization for up to $202K + equity. Translate internal AI predictions about a drug’s likelihood of success into concrete portfolio decisions, and build the risk management and performance tracking systems those decisions rely on. This role uniquely combines quantitative finance, healthcare data, and drug development, and it carries real influence over which assets receive funding.

  4. Senior Director or VP, Product for up to $467K (depending on level) + equity. Own product strategy for a specific problem or bottleneck in drug development (e.g. candidate evaluation, trial execution) and be accountable for the success of the tools, models, and systems that make drug development decisions faster and better.

  5. Principal Data Scientist, Medical Imaging for up to $267K + equity. Lead the team’s efforts to integrate advanced imaging analytics and AI into the drug development pipeline. Build the models that read MRIs, CTs, and PET scans in clinical trials, which often serve as trial endpoints measuring treatment efficacy.

  6. General Manager (Drug Asset Lead) for up to $388.5K + equity. Own the end-to-end strategy of a Formation Bio asset, managing the budget, execution, and outcomes. Work closely with a Clinical Lead, a Tech Lead, and functional experts across regulatory and data science, and report progress directly to the leadership team. (Note: the level for this role is flexible. Please reach out if you fall outside the posted range.)

  7. Software Engineer for up to $267K + equity. Work across the drug development lifecycle, embedded directly with clinical, regulatory, and BD teams. This is a broad engineering role for someone who treats AI tools as core to how they build, not a side experiment. (Note: the level for this role is flexible. Please reach out if you fall outside the posted range.)

  8. Senior Data Scientist for up to $232K + equity. Lead and execute data science projects that directly advance the drug development portfolio. You’ll develop and implement AI models for therapeutic hypothesis evaluation, including patient stratification and biomarker identification, and aid in the development and training of AI agents to automate and optimize biomedical workflows.

  9. Principal Data Scientist for up to $267K + equity. Lead crucial initiatives that directly impact the drug portfolio, from developing sophisticated models for patient selection to creating AI-powered solutions for clinical trial optimization.

  10. Director, Business Development - Search & Evaluation for up to $307K + equity. Identify and evaluate early-stage drug assets for the business development pipeline, guiding potential opportunities from asset identification to transaction closing.

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