AstraZeneca on cord

AstraZeneca

Director, Data Scientist

External position
Cambridge, UK
Hiring internally for AstraZeneca?
Pharmaceuticals · BioTech · HealthTech
What science can do
Posted
2 days ago
Checked
cord regularly checks that external positions are still open
14 hours ago

Skills & Experience

Job roles: Data Scientist
Experience level: Senior, Lead, Leadership
Core skills considered: Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Python, Deep Learning
Other skills considered: Cloud Computing, AWS, Azure, GCP

Logistics

Base salary: Undisclosed
Some companies on cord are unable to disclose salaries publicly due to internal company policies. Message the company for salary information.
Employment type: Permanent
Remote working: Hybrid (up to 2 remote days p/w)
Visa sponsorship: Not available

Job Description

Bringing new treatments to patients demands scientific excellence at every stage of development. In the Clinical AI team, we focus on one of the most data-rich and decision-intensive parts of that journey: clinical development. Trial design, patient selection, dose optimisation, biomarker strategy, and safety evaluation each represent genuine opportunities where AI and machine learning can add rigour, speed, and precision - not as a replacement for clinical and statistical expertise, but as a powerful complement to it. We hold ourselves to measurable standards of improvement, and we build methods that can be evaluated, reproduced, and trusted in regulatory settings.

You will work across the enterprise to define and deliver on AstraZeneca's most pressing clinical development questions - leading cross-functional teams spanning the key BioPharmaceuticals disease areas of cardiovascular, renal, metabolic disease, respiratory, immunology and cell-therapy. You and the team will develop reusable methods and enterprise-scale approaches that measurably advance the late-stage drug pipeline. This is a high-visibility opportunity to shape how AstraZeneca does AI for BioPharmaceuticals clinical development - from methodology standards to external scientific influence.

AI for clinical development is a field in motion. Foundation models, agentic systems, and causal AI are advancing rapidly, and the regulatory and methodological frameworks around them are evolving in parallel. As a Director, Data Scientist, you will define and drive the AI methodology agenda for one or more programmes within Clinical AI, leading by scientific influence and matrix coordination rather than through a formal hierarchy. You will be the scientific authority that study teams, biometrics, and regulatory colleagues turn to - and AstraZeneca's voice externally at the critical moment when the rules of the road for AI in clinical trials are being written.


Key Responsibilities

  • Define and drive the AI methodology roadmap for assigned Clinical AI programmes, spanning early and late phase clinical development, and aligning AI/ML priorities with clinical and business objectives.
  • Lead, by matrix influence and scientific authority, the delivery of the most complex and high-stakes AI projects - from problem definition and methodology selection through validation, regulatory alignment, and scaled adoption across the enterprise.
  • Develop and govern reusable, enterprise-grade AI methods and evaluation frameworks for clinical trial settings, including innovative trial design support, dose optimisation, biomarker discovery, digital twins, predictive and prognostic modelling, and safety and efficacy signal detection.
  • Champion data-centric AI practices at programme level: govern the acquisition, curation, and quality control of datasets for model training, post-training, benchmarking, and evaluation across clinical and regulatory settings.
  • Partner with Clinical Development, Biometrics, Regulatory, and Study Teams to embed AI strategy and validated solutions into study design and decision-making at programme level.
  • Shape the AI evidence component for regulatory submission packages; act as the scientific and methodological voice in regulatory engagements involving AI/ML methods or innovative trial designs (FDA, EMA, MHRA).
  • Evaluate and champion cutting-edge AI methodologies - including foundation models, agentic AI systems, generative patient models, multimodal learning, Bayesian inference, causal inference, and model calibration and domain adaptation - proposing fit-for-purpose approaches with robust evaluation criteria and risk assessment.
  • Establish and maintain external collaborations with academic institutions, technology partners, and industry consortia to access novel capabilities and advance the scientific agenda.
  • Represent AstraZeneca at scientific conferences, standards bodies, and peer-reviewed venues; contribute first- or last-author publications in leading ML and clinical AI journals.
  • Serve as a technical mentor and thought partner for Associate Directors and Senior Data Scientists within the Clinical AI team; promote scientific rigour, reuse, and a culture of learning in public.
  • Contribute to the broader AISI AI for Clinical Development strategy, including cross-functional ways of working, tooling governance, and methodology standards.

Essential Requirements

  • PhD in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Statistics, Mathematics, Biomedical Informatics, Computational Biology, or a closely related quantitative discipline - with a strong, hands-on computational track record.
  • 4-8 years of post-PhD experience in AI and machine learning method development, with demonstrated and sustained impact in clinical, biomedical, or drug development settings (e.g. models delivered, first-author publications, patents, SaMD filings, open-source projects).
  • Deep experience, knowledge, and understanding of one or more fields of biology, with hands-on experience working with biological data such as molecular (DNA, RNA, protein), imaging (radiology, microscopy), or clinical text (EHR, clinical notes).
  • Deep expertise in modern AI methodologies, including one or more of: foundation model training and fine-tuning; Bayesian inference; temporal and longitudinal modelling; multimodal integration; model calibration and domain adaptation; data-centric AI; model interpretability; model post-training and alignment.
  • Exceptional software engineering skills: Python, deep learning frameworks (e.g. PyTorch), frontier coding agent frameworks, modern LLM tooling, and cloud platforms (e.g. AWS, Azure, GCP).
  • Demonstrated experience translating AI methods into applications that inform clinical and/or biomedical decisions, including prospective evaluation or contribution to submission-relevant evidence.
  • Track record of driving scientific influence across cross-functional communities - ML, clinical, biostatistics, regulatory - without relying on formal authority.
  • Peer-reviewed publications in clinical AI, computational drug development, or leading ML venues (e.g. NeurIPS, ICML, ICLR, Nature Medicine, Lancet Digital Health).
  • Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with demonstrated ability to translate technical findings for clinical, regulatory, and executive audiences.

Desirable Skills and Experience

  • Direct industry experience in early or late phase BioPharmaceuticals clinical development, including clinical trial design, biomarker discovery, companion diagnostics, dosing, safety, endpoints, or regulatory processes.
  • Direct experience contributing to FDA, EMA, PMDA, or MHRA submissions involving AI/ML methods or innovative trial designs.
  • Prior regulatory engagement on AI methodology, complex innovative trial design, or AI/ML qualification opinions.
  • Experience with MLOps and LLMOps at scale, including CI/CD pipelines and enterprise deployment.
  • Open-source contributions, workshop organisation, or standards-body participation.
  • Knowledge of computing hardware and its impact on model training and inference at scale.
  • Experience in a complex global organisation spanning multiple sites and therapy areas.
  • Strong proficiency in augmenting - but not supplanting - daily knowledge work with agentic AI tools.
  • Proactively up-to-date with the latest AI research; tries out new tools and methods of interest without waiting to be directed.
  • Team-oriented mindset: does what is best for the team and the programme, not just the individual deliverable.
  • Ability to deliver high-quality, high-impact contributions independently and at pace.
  • Comfort with ambiguity and an instinct to learn in public, prototype early, and fail forward.
  • Deep, up-to-date knowledge of the ML literature and active connections with the ML community.
Director, Data Scientist at AstraZeneca
Position posted 2 days ago

Talk directly
to who's hiring

cord intros you to the companies worth joining, from seed to enterprise.

Everything you need to find work

Surface every relevant position, direct message the people hiring and manage all your applications in one place.

Get started

Every position in one place

We index the web for open positions that might be relevant to you and bring them all in one place.

Positions you might like split into tabs based on their type

Direct messaging

No more CV blackholes. Message people hiring directly and see their activity live on cord.

A sent message to a hiring manager
A board of positions in different stages

Application management

Manage all your applications and interviews in one place.

Advanced insights

Know your worth and see how you compare with other applicants.

Visualisation of a profile match score for a position and score comparison with other applicants

Direct.
Transparent.
Human.

On cord you can message people hiring directly, see when they were last active, how responsive they are and access transparent information that you wouldn't be able to find anywhere else.

Photos people at Starling BankPhotos people at Starling BankPhotos people at Starling BankPhotos people at Starling BankPhotos people at Starling Bank
Starling Bank on cord

Starling Bank

Full Stack Engineer (ML Ops)

London, UK
FinTech · Banking · Finance
A better bank for everyone
Active
over 6 months ago
Responds to
0% of requests
Responds in
1h 55m
Requests
7 pending

Skills & Experience

Job roles: Full Stack
Experience level: Mid, Senior
Core skills considered: Java, React, Redux, AWS, JavaScript

Logistics

Base salary: £70K - £110K
Employment type: Permanent
Remote working: Hybrid (up to 2 remote days p/w)
Visa sponsorship: Not available

Job Description

Starling is the UK’s first and leading digital bank on a mission to fix banking! Our vision is fast technology, fair service, and honest values. All at the tap of a phone, all the time.

Starling is the UK’s first and leading digital bank on a mission to fix banking! We built a new kind of bank because we knew technology had the power to help people save, spend and manage their money in a new and transformative way.

We’re a fully licensed UK bank with the culture and spirit of a fast-moving, disruptive tech company. We’re a bank, but better: fairer, easier to use and designed to demystify money for everyone. We employ more than 3,000 people across our London, Southampton, Cardiff and Manchester offices.

Our technologists are at the very heart of Starling and enjoy working in a fast-paced environment that is all about building things, creating new stuff, and disruptive technology that keeps us on the cutting edge of fintech. We operate a flat structure to empower you to make decisions regardless of what your primary responsibilities may be, innovation and collaboration will be at the core of everything you do. Help is never far away in our open culture, you will find support in your team and from across the business, we are in this together!

The way to thrive and shine within Starling is to be a self-driven individual and be able to take full ownership of everything around you: From building things, designing, discovering, to sharing knowledge with your colleagues and making sure all processes are efficient and productive to deliver the best possible results for our customers. Our purpose is underpinned by five Starling values: Listen, Keep It Simple, Do The Right Thing, Own It, and Aim For Greatness.

Hybrid Working

We have a Hybrid approach to working here at Starling - our preference is that you're located within a commutable distance of one of our offices so that we're able to interact and collaborate in person. We don't like to mandate how much you visit the office and work from home, that's to be agreed upon between you and your manager.

Our Data Environment

Our Data teams are excited about the value of data within the business, powers our product decisions to improve things for our customers and enhance effective and agile decision making, regardless of what their primary tech stack may be. Hear from the team in our latest blogs or our case studies with Women in Tech.

We are looking for talented data professionals at all levels to join the team. We value people being engaged and caring about customers, caring about the code they write and the contribution they make to Starling. People with a broad ability to apply themselves to a multitude of problems and challenges, who can work across teams do great things here at Starling, to continue changing banking for good.

Requirements

We have built our entire banking platform in house and mostly in Java. We are looking for people who want to work on building the tooling that is used by our engineers on a daily basis.

We are looking for people who are truly full stack, and are as comfortable polishing their javascript front end as they are debugging the innards of their java applications database interactions, or standing up infrastructure with terraform. We are looking for people who can:

  • Design REST apis.
  • Code backend services, ideally using Java, or another other server side compiled language.
  • Develop modern front ends, ideally using React and Redux.
  • Get their code into the cloud and support it there, ideally on AWS.
  • Believe in clean coding, simple solutions, automated testing and continuous deployment.
  • Like to take ownership of a feature from the original idea through to live.
  • Think (like us) that a small number of empowered developers is the right way to deliver software.

Company Benefits

  • 33 days holiday (including flexible bank holidays)
  • An extra day’s holiday for your birthday
  • 16 hours paid volunteering time a year
  • Part-time and/or flexible hours available for most roles
  • Salary sacrifice, company enhanced pension scheme
  • Life insurance at 4x your salary
  • Hybrid/remote working
  • Private Medical Insurance with VitalityHealth including mental health support and cancer care. Partner benefits include discounts with Waitrose, Mr&Mrs Smith and Peloton
  • Generous family-friendly policies
  • Varied social groups set up and run by our employees
  • Perkbox membership giving access to retail discounts, a wellness platform for physical and mental health, and weekly free and boosted perks
  • Access to initiatives like Cycle to Work, Salary Sacrificed Gym partnerships and Electric Vehicle (EV) leasing

Full details are available on our careers site

Interview Process

Interviewing is a two way process and we want you to have the time and opportunity to get to know us, as much as we are getting to know you! Our interviews are conversational and we want to get the best from you, so come with questions and be curious. In general you can expect the below, following a chat with one of our Talent Team:

  • Stage 1 - 30 mins with one of the team
  • Stage 2 - Take home challenge
  • Stage 3 - 90 mins technical interview with two team members
  • Stage 3 - 45 min final with an executive and a member of the people team
Alex Yeates on cord
Message Alex Yeates at Starling Bank
Typically responds in an hour

What people are saying

2,000+

users joining every week

Oliver on cord

Oliver

Software Engineering Consultant
It's really easy to use, has a solid selection of jobs, and makes it helpful to direct message companies. The platform seems to offer a good range of opportunities while keeping the process simple and convenient.
November, 2025
David on cord

David

Lead Software Engineer
The platform allows you to create a professional CV, making the setup process simple and polished. The internal chat also provides an easy way to directly contact hiring companies, which makes communication much more efficient.
November, 2025
40,000+

open positions

Nicolae on cord

Nicolae

Senior Full Stack Developer
It is a great platform if you are looking for a job. It makes the search process straight forward and gives you access to solid opportunities.
November, 2025
3 million+

messages exchanged so far

Nicolae on cord

Nicolae

Senior Full Stack Developer
It is a great platform if you are looking for a job. It makes the search process straight forward and gives you access to solid opportunities.
November, 2025
79.15%

response rate from companies

Aarambha on cord

Aarambha

Associate Software Engineer
Absolutely amazing idea, the ability to see which recruiters are active makes finding opportunities very quick. There is a form of transparency built into the website that lacks in any other job searching platform.
August, 2025
Adam on cord

Adam

Senior Engineer
cord was great. Clean UI, easy to browse, and the data feature made it a breeze to quickly check whether my profile would match up well with a particular role. The messaging system made it easy to approach companies but also filter out unwanted requests.
August, 2025
4.6

score on Trustpilot

Talk directly to the people that matter

Join the hundred of thousands of people using cord to find work

Get started
 on cord
 on cord
 on cord
 on cord
 on cord
+424 joined last week
Moved to your Not right positions