Full-Time
Proteomics Principal Investigator
Posted on 8/16/2025
Sapient Bioanalytics
11-50 employees
Metabolomics lab enabling rapid biomarker discovery
Compensation Overview
$135k - $185k/yr
San Diego, CA, USA
In Person
 Biology & Biotech (2) |
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- At least 5 years of experience in CRO, pharmaceuticals and/or biotechnology, with experience in LC-MS/MS instrumentation (orbitrap, Q-TOF, timsTOF) and data analysis pipelines (DDA, DIA, PRM, MRM/SRM, TMT/iTRAQ, PTM).
- 5 years’ experience in a leadership role managing scientific projects and teams.
- Proven ability to design and execute complex proteomics experiments (discovery, targeted, PTM analysis).
- Experience in client-facing roles, scientific presentations, and cross-functional collaboration.
- Holds a PhD/MD in a relevant field (e.g. chemistry, biochemistry, biology, pharmacology, clinician or related life science discipline) or equivalent work experience. BS + 10 years relevant experience. MS +5 years relevant experience.
- At least 5 years of experience in pharmaceuticals and/or biotechnology, with experience in mass spectrometry techniques.
- Five years of management experience.
- Exposure to metabolomics and proteomics methodologies, including mass spectrometry, and data analysis.
- Professional experience working in proteomics with a focus on, but not limited to, mass-spectrometry-based methods and data analysis.
- Enjoys educating internal and external stakeholders.
- Ability to manage many tasks in parallel, complete projects on time, and work well in a team setting.
- Possesses a strong analytical mindset to interpret complex data and draw meaningful conclusions.
- Thrives in collaborative environments, capable of working seamlessly with multidisciplinary teams that may include biologists, chemists, clinicians, software engineers, and data scientists.
- Exhibits meticulousness in work product to ensure accurate and reliable results.
- Keeps up to date with the latest advancements in precision medicine.
- Can articulate complex scientific concepts in a clear and concise manner, both in writing and in presentations.
- Effective at collaborating with peers, mentoring junior researchers, and participating in scientific discussions.
- This role is a client-facing position and pivotal partner to laboratory operations leadership, driving client success, and communicating transformative biological insights to our customers across many therapeutic areas and modalities. Within this capacity, manage 15+ client programs, participate in study design, craft project plans, and orchestrate seamless handoff of information between clients and laboratory personnel.
- Collaborate with top-tier thinkers and experts that promote personal and professional growth through enriching training initiatives.
- Project management between the client and within the wet- and dry-lab to ensure deliverables are being met and troubleshooting when necessary.
- Develop research strategies, study plans and reports for projects.
- Review mass spectrometry spectra and perform compound identification.
- Ensure results are generated to the appropriate quality and regulatory standards for their intended purpose.
- Compile data and results into final presentations and data packages.
- Prioritization, organization, and understanding of numerous projects to ensure timelines and deliverables are met.
- Interpretation of scientific results.
- Remain current with scientific literature and technological advancements.
Sapient Bioanalytics identifies small molecule biomarkers to help researchers understand disease progression and drug response. The platform uses mass spectrometry to profile over 11,000 biomarkers per sample in under a minute, then applies machine learning to analyze the results against a database of hundreds of thousands of human biosamples. Unlike competitors, Sapient can process thousands of samples daily and validate findings using decades of patient follow-up data. The goal is to provide faster and more efficient drug development solutions by uncovering biological insights at a population scale.
Company Size
11-50
Company Stage
Grant
Total Funding
$13.8M
Headquarters
San Diego, California
Founded
2020
Simplify's Take
What believers are saying
- FFPE Proteomics platform analyzes 10,000+ proteins from 5-micron slides, unlocking archived biorepositories.
- $9.2M Gates Foundation grant in 2022 validates population-scale biomarker discovery for global health.
- Jonathan Usuka's 2024 CEO appointment drives commercial scaling of proteomics and metabolomics services.
What critics are saying
- Thermo Fisher and Bruker commoditize proteomics, eroding Sapient's pricing by 2027.
- FDA requires prospective validation, invalidating retrospective FFPE data within 18 months.
- Oncology client loss to Roche internalization cuts 20% revenue in 12 months.
What makes Sapient Bioanalytics unique
- Sapient's rLC-MS platform profiles 11,000 small molecule biomarkers per biosample in under one minute.
- DynamiQ Insights Engine integrates multi-omics data from 67,000+ longitudinally phenotyped samples.
- Tumor Protein Mapping Platform offers SurfaceSeek, SignalingSeek, ImmuneSeek, and ResistanceSeek workflows.
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Growth & Insights and Company News
6 month growth
↑ 12%1 year growth
↑ 16%2 year growth
↑ 16%Sapient launches advanced FFPE Proteomics platform. The next-generation proteomics platform is designed to extract deep protein-level insights from archived tissue, enabling broad, integrated multi-omic mapping of tumor biology. Sapient (CA, USA) this week announced the release of their MS-driven FFPE (formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded) Proteomics platform that quantifies more than 10,000 proteins from a single 5-micron FFPE slide. Designed to overcome long-standing challenges in analyzing FFPE, the system offers unmatched depth across tumor and tissue samples, capturing phosphoproteins, glyco-proteins and rare protein variants with strong reproducibility. FFPE samples represent one of the world's most abundant biomedical resources, yet traditional technologies struggle to extract meaningful protein-level insights from them due to the impact of fixation on protein structures. Sapient's new workflow captures more than 10,000 protein groups per 5 μm FFPE slide and provides insight into pathway activation, post-translational modifications and drug distribution, which are usually missed by traditional approaches such as DNA sequencing, RNA sequencing and immunohistochemistry. Integrated with Sapient's broader omics portfolio, including single-cell sequencing and spatial profiling, the platform supports comprehensive multi-omic mapping from genetic mutation to functional impact, with the ability to scale analyses across thousands of samples. "What's most exciting is that we can now go back to the vast biorepositories of FFPE tissue samples already collected, and using our method, essentially turn them into new discovery engines - unlocking previously hidden protein-level insights that add the critical layer of functional biology to existing genomics datasets," explained Mo Jain, Founder and Chief Scientific Officer at Sapient. "We can then go even further using our FFPE Multi-Omics platform, not only combining FFPE proteomics and DNA-seq but also single-cell sequencing and spatial profiling data to map tumor biology from mutation to pathway activation, cell-type and spatial localization." As part of the FFPE Proteomics platform, Sapient's DynamIQ(TM) virtual biobank further offers rapid access to thousands of annotated FFPE tumors and tissues for biopharma partners. "By providing access to actionable FFPE tissue samples, we can support rapid retrospective studies to identify disease biomarkers, patient responders and drug mechanism of action insights that can optimize prospective studies and de-risk drug development efforts," noted Jonathan Usuka, Chief Executive Officer at Sapient. "We truly believe our complete FFPE offering will be a game-changer for discovery, translational and clinical teams in oncology and beyond."
FREMONT, Calif., Feb. 20, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Alamar Biosciences, a company powering precision proteomics to enable the earliest detection of disease, is proud to announce the launch of its Certified Service Provider (CSP) Program, designed to expand access to its cutting-edge NULISA™ assays in academia and biopharmaceutical research
SAN DIEGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sapient, a leading biomarker discovery organization providing at scale services for multi-omics data generation and analysis, has announced the appointment of Jonathan Usuka, PhD, MBA as Chief Business Officer, expanding its leadership team to support and further propel the company’s rapid growth. In this role, Dr. Usuka will lead Sapient’s global business strategy for commercial collaborations, strategic partnerships, and client service innovations across its proteomic and metabolomic offerings leveraging Sapient’s Human Biology Database, the company’s industry leading real-world data asset. He will be the driving force in identifying new opportunities to serve therapeutic clients with Sapient’s large-scale multi-omics lab and unique data capabilities to enable advances in disease prediction, drug development, diagnostics, and personalized treatments for patients. “We are absolutely thrilled to welcome Jonathan into this critical leadership role for Sapient,” said Mo Jain, MD, PhD, Founder and CEO of Sapient. “He is a rare talent possessing both deep scientific acumen and extensive experience in business development and growth strategy, particularly in applying data and informatics to accelerate biopharma RD
SAN DIEGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sapient, a biomarker discovery organization providing bespoke services for multi-omics data generation and analysis, has announced the roll-out of its high throughput discovery proteomics services, enabling measure of thousands of proteins in blood and tissue across diverse biological pathways. This offering further extends Sapient’s capabilities for dynamic biomarker discovery, utilizing its state-of-the-art mass spectrometry-based platform, which also powers its discovery metabolomics and lipidomics approaches.“We are particularly excited to extend Sapient’s offerings to include discovery proteomics,” said Jeramie Watrous, PhD, Co-Founder and Head of Analytical R&D at Sapient. “Measuring the proteome, particularly in blood, is a balance of protein depth and throughput. There are a number of approaches currently on the market for large-scale proteomics, and each of these has their own limitations, whether it be in the number of proteins that are assayed, the capture of proteoforms, the robustness of protein annotation, or in extension across varied species. We wanted to ensure our discovery proteomics offering could meet the varied demands of our biopharma and academic customers and provide a clear solution to each of these critical challenges, in line with the development phase or specific study objectives. In multiple matrices, including preclinical and clinical samples, we can generate data on thousands of proteins across thousands of samples, and integrate that data with other omics information to amplify biomarker discovery potential.”Mass spectrometry achieves high analytical specificity by directly measuring peptides to annotate proteins and post-translational modifications (PTMs)
The grant from Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation supports studies to identify biomarkers that inform novel disease prevention & treatment interventions.