Senior Automation Engineer

About the role

Xaira is a biotech startup focused on using AI to transform drug discovery and development. The company develops generative AI models for protein and antibody therapeutics and foundation models for biology and disease. The role is located in the San Francisco Bay Area, Seattle, and London.

Key Responsibilities

• Design, program, deploy, and support automated laboratory workflows using liquid handlers and integrated workcells.
• Build and improve software, data, and control interfaces connecting laboratory instruments, automation platforms, and informatics systems like LIMS and ELN.
• Develop tools to make lab automation more observable, adaptive, and AI-ready.
• Partner with scientists, software engineers, data teams, robotics engineers, IT partners, and external collaborators to identify automation opportunities and productionize workflows.
• Document protocols, system architecture, troubleshooting procedures, and best practices, while establishing scalable automation standards for the organization.
• Mentor junior engineers and help guide technical decisions across automation projects.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Engineering, Computer Science, Bioengineering, or an automation-related technical field.
• 5+ years of lab automation experience and 2+ years of hands-on experience with liquid handling platforms such as Hamilton, Tecan, Beckman, or similar systems.
• Strong programming skills, preferably in Python and/or C#.
• Experience with laboratory data systems, including SQL, data modeling, metadata capture, and/or pipeline orchestration.
• Experience integrating automation systems with LIMS, ELN, or other laboratory informatics platforms.
• Experience connecting instruments or automation systems through APIs, middleware, IoT frameworks, or similar integration approaches.
• Strong troubleshooting skills and a systems-thinking mindset across hardware, software, data, and biological workflows.
• Ability to work effectively with scientists, engineers, software teams, data teams, vendors, and other cross-functional stakeholders.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with automation orchestration software such as Cellario, Momentum, Green Button Go, or similar platforms.
• Experience training, adapting, or evaluating AI/language models for tool use and real-world system interaction, including structured APIs, MCP-style connectors, software control layers, hardware interfaces, and agentic workflows.
• Experience or interest in computer vision for physical lab systems, including training or fine-tuning models for object detection, segmentation, pose estimation, labware detection, quality control, or monitoring applications using tools such as OpenCV, YOLO, SAM, or bounding-box/annotation workflows.
• Familiarity with molecular biology, cell biology, chemistry, or other wet-lab workflows.
• Experience with Benchling, AWS, cloud infrastructure, distributed systems, or modern data infrastructure.
• Experience mentoring junior engineers or helping establish automation best practices.