Product Manager, Platform

Benchling; San Francisco (CA); Hybrid; USD 163,000 - 307,000; Full time

Job summary

Benchling is redefining biotech R&D with an AI-driven data foundation. As Schemas PM, you’ll own schema types, computed fields, and data versioning, enabling AI features across the platform.

You’ll work to align admins, scientists, and developers around clear data contracts and scalable data models. You’ll partner with Engineering, Design, Customer Experience, and Sales to advance structured data as the core AI value driver and shape the roadmap for how Benchling models scientific data for

Qualifications

• Strong platform thinking and systems perspective for building scalable data models.
• Experience designing or evolving a data-modeling or configuration system used by external developers or admins.
• Ability to build personas and JTBD frameworks from scratch, not just use provided ones.

Responsibilities

• Set product direction for Schemas and ship increments while maintaining platform stability.
• Track customer usage and build sharp personas and JTBD context for admins, scientists, and developers.
• Collaborate with Engineering and Design to deliver new schema capabilities.

Skills

Platform thinking

Data modeling

JTBD discovery

Cross-functional leadership

Technical communication

Job description

We are rebuilding biotech for the AI era.

When a breakthrough is delayed, the world waits. Getting a molecule from discovery to patients, or a crop from lab to field, involves thousands of slow, manual, disconnected steps. AI has the potential to change this, compressing decades of R&D work into years. But that only happens when clean, structured scientific data and AI are built into how science gets done.

Benchling is the AI platform for biotech R&D. Scientists use Benchling to design experiments, capture structured data, and run AI agents and models directly in their workflows. Over 200,000 scientists around the world trust Benchling to power their most important work, from academic labs to Sanofi, Moderna, and more than half of the world's top 50 biopharma.

We’re building an AI scientist for our customers. We can’t do that if we haven’t built the muscle ourselves. AI fluency is the foundation we build on; it's core to how we work, and we're committed to helping every new hire integrate it into their day-to-day. As part of our interview process, you'll complete a brief AI-focused exercise or discussion so we can understand how you think about and use AI to drive impact in your role. Feel free to reference any tools, platforms, or workflows you use today.

Role Overview

AI is only as good as the data underneath it. Schemas is the configuration layer where customers model their scientific data and processes. It's the customer-defined data model that makes Benchling different from a point solution, and the contract every other system (internal apps, integrations, AI agents) relies on when reading or writing to Benchling. Get it right, and AI inherits a solid foundation; get it wrong, every layer above inherits the problem.

As Schemas PM, you own the primitives (schema types, computed fields, fieldsets, constraints, static properties, data versioning) that every other team at Benchling builds on top of. This is one of the highest-leverage, most technically interesting roles on the platform team, and one we're investing in now as AI features across Benchling increasingly depend on the quality of the underlying data model.

Responsibilities

• Set product direction for Schemas and ship toward it incrementally, balancing fast prototyping with the platform stability admins and developers depend on.
• Relentlessly track how customers use Schemas — where it delights, where it fails — and build sharp personas and job-to-be-done context for each user type (admins, scientists, computational teams, internal and external developers).
• Bring customer "why," not just feature requests, back to Engineering and Design; partner with them closely to ship new capabilities.
• Champion structured, well-modeled data as the foundation for AI value across Benchling, anticipating what schema consumers will need next.
• Partner with Customer Experience, Field, Sales, and Marketing to get customer signal into the roadmap early.
• Partner closely with other Platform and Apps PMs — schemas underpin nearly every other platform surface, so alignment on sequencing and shared abstractions matters as much as your own roadmap.

Qualifications

• Energized by platform work and systems thinking; comfortable building the right abstraction ahead of need.
• Has designed, owned, or significantly evolved a data-modeling, schema, or configuration system used by external developers or technical admins — not just consumed one as a feature.
• Becomes the go-to person for customers, field, and engineers — not a router to engineering.
• Deep, demonstrated discovery practice: has built personas and JTBD frameworks from scratch, not just used ones handed to them.
• Track record balancing long-term vision with incremental shipping.
• Strong communicator across technical and executive audiences; B2B SaaS or developer-platform background preferred.
• Genuine curiosity about the science behind the data. You don't need a science background, but you should want one by the end of your first quarter here.

How We Work

Flexible Hybrid Work: We offer a flexible hybrid work arrangement that prioritizes in-office collaboration. Employees are expected to be on-site Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday.

Benchling welcomes everyone.

We believe diversity enriches our team so we hire people with a wide range of identities, backgrounds, and experiences.

We are an equal opportunity employer. That means we don’t discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status. We also consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records, consistent with applicable federal, state and local law, including but not limited to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance.

Compensation Range: $163K - $307K