Associate Counsel, Life Sciences

Certara USA, Inc.; Wayne (PA); On-site; USD 110,000 - 170,000; Full time

Job summary

Certara USA, Inc. seeks a commercially minded attorney to support its U.S. legal contracting function.

You will negotiate a broad portfolio of life sciences and technology agreements, advise business teams in practical terms, and help deliver a disciplined contracting experience through templates, playbooks, and escalation standards. You will have meaningful ownership of matters appropriate to your experience, with senior support for high‑risk or strategically significant issues.

Qualifications

• Juris Doctor and active license in at least one U.S. jurisdiction.
• 1–3 years of relevant commercial transactions experience.
• Strong drafting and negotiation skills for MSAs, services, SaaS licenses, and privacy/data-processing terms.
• Life sciences, pharmaceutical, biotech, health tech, software, data, or professional-services transactions preferred.
• Familiarity with privacy/regulatory issues; HIPAA and GDPR exposure preferred.
• Strong organization, attention to detail, responsiveness, and ability to manage multiple matters.

Responsibilities

• Draft, review, and negotiate master services agreements, commercial and service agreements, SaaS and software licenses, data privacy agreements and DPAs, vendor and consulting agreements, reseller agreements, development/developer agreements, and amendments.
• Manage assigned matters from intake through signature, maintaining status, approvals, and records.
• Apply Legal playbooks, templates, thresholds, and escalation; identify issues for updated guidance or templates.
• Advise business stakeholders in plain language; collaborate with Sales, Finance, Privacy, Security, Procurement, and Commercial Operations.
• Review revisions with complex terms and route to senior escalation when needed.
• Support ownership of order form and task order templates, including quality checks and self-service.
• Respect the boundary: Legal owns terms and templates; Commercial Operations handles forms and orders.
• Contribute to knowledge management, training, metrics, and playbook updates.
• Balance contract velocity and risk with sound judgment and organization.

Skills

Contract drafting

Negotiation

MSA / SOW experience

Privacy / data processing terms

Life sciences transactions

HIPAA / GDPR familiarity

Attention to detail

Multi-matter management

Education

Juris Doctor / JD or equivalent

Bar admission in at least one U.S. jurisdiction

Job description

Overview

Certara accelerates the potential of bringing medicines to market and to patients using biosimulation software, technology, and services to transform traditional drug discovery and development. Our clients include more than 2,400 biopharmaceutical companies, academic institutions, and regulatory agencies across 70 countries.

Our goal is to enable the life sciences industry's use of data, modeling, and analytics to make better decisions across the various phases of discovery and drug development. Our software and scientists incorporate modern advances in scientific understanding, drug development experience, data analysis, and AI resulting in significant opportunities to decrease the cost and increase the probability of success for new drug approval and commercialization.

Responsibilities

We are seeking a commercially minded attorney to support our U.S. legal contracting function. You will negotiate a broad portfolio of life sciences and technology agreements, advise business teams in practical terms, and help deliver a disciplined, scalable contracting experience through clear templates, playbooks, and escalation standards.

You will have meaningful ownership of matters appropriate to your experience, with senior support for novel, high-risk, or strategically significant issues. Legal owns the contracting framework and legal terms. Commercial Operations continues to populate and execute order forms and task orders within Legal-approved templates.

• Draft, review, and negotiate master services agreements, commercial and service agreements, SaaS and software license agreements, data privacy agreements and DPAs, vendor and consulting agreements, reseller agreements, development/developer agreements, and amendments, escalating novel or high-risk issues as appropriate.
• Manage assigned matters from intake through signature, maintaining clear status, required approvals, and organized matter records.
• Apply Legal playbooks, templates, approval thresholds, and fallback positions consistently; identify recurring issues that should be addressed through updated guidance, templates, or process improvements.
• Advise business stakeholders in plain language and collaborate closely with Sales, Finance, Privacy, Security, Procurement, and Commercial Operations.
• Review revisions that introduce legal or complex commercial terms, including revisions to evaluation agreements, and route matters for senior escalation when needed.
• Support Legal ownership of order form and task order templates, including quality checks and controlled self-service.
• Respect the operating boundary: Commercial Operations populates and executes order forms and task orders; Legal owns the framework, legal terms, templates, and escalations.
• Contribute to knowledge management, training, metrics, template maintenance, playbook updates, and alternative legal talent/provider coordination.
• Balance contract velocity and risk using sound judgment, strong organization, and responsive stakeholder communication.

Qualifications

• Juris Doctor (or equivalent law degree) and active membership in good standing in at least one U.S. jurisdiction.
• Approximately 1-3 years of relevant commercial transactions experience at a law firm, in-house legal department, or comparable environment.
• Strong foundational drafting and negotiation skills, particularly for MSAs, services agreements, SaaS/software licenses, SOW-related frameworks, and privacy/data-processing terms.
• Experience with life sciences, pharmaceutical, biotech, health technology, software, data, or professional-services transactions is strongly preferred.
• Working familiarity with privacy and regulated-data issues; exposure to HIPAA and GDPR is preferred.
• Sound judgment about when to resolve an issue independently and when to escape.
• Strong organization, attention to detail, responsiveness, and comfort managing multiple matters and deadlines.
• Interest in contract playbooks, template maintenance, knowledge management, and process improvement.

How success will be measured

• Assigned agreements progress promptly, accurately, and in line with Legal playbooks and approval requirements.
• Escalations are timely and well framed, with clear facts, options, and recommended paths.
• Matter status, approvals, key dates, and supporting records remain accurate and complete.Templates and repeatable guidance are applied consistently, and recurring issues are surfaced for improvement.
• Business partners receive practical, clear, and responsive support.

Certara bases all employment-related decision on merit, taking into consideration qualifications, skills, achievement, and performance. We treat all applicants and employees without regard to personal characteristics such as race, color, ethnicity, religion, sex, sexual orientation, age, nationality, marital status, pregnancy, physical or mental condition, genetic information, military service, or other characteristic protected by law.