Production Automation Specialist

Dash Bio; Waltham (MA); On-site; USD 120,000 - 170,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive salary

Comprehensive benefits package

Growth opportunities

Collaborative culture

Job summary

Dash Bio is building automated liquid handling platforms for fast, data-driven drug development. We seek a Production Automation Specialist to oversee day-to-day production, bridging lab workflows and engineering to industrialize our platform.

The role requires hands-on experience with Hamilton STAR/Vantage, EL406 washers, and Thermo Fisher peripherals, plus 5+ years in production or clinical lab automation. You will drive process improvements and mentor junior staff on SOPs and safety features.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s or Master’s in bioengineering/biotech with 5+ years in lab automation.
• Proven experience configuring or troubleshooting lab automation in fast-paced settings.
• Hands-on proficiency with Hamilton STAR/Vantage and related devices.
• Strong understanding of hardware-software integration and data integrity.

Responsibilities

• Oversee daily production workflows and ensure high-quality liquid handling.
• Troubleshoot hardware and software bottlenecks on automated systems.
• Identify bottlenecks and implement data-driven process improvements.
• Mentor junior team members and train on SOPs and safety features.
• Collaborate with scientists, software, and hardware teams to align capabilities.

Skills

Automation platform

Biological workflow

Technical aptitude

Process mindset

Lab automation experience

Education

Bioengineering degree

Tools

Hamilton STAR/Vantage

EL406 washer

Synergy NEO

KingfisherFlex

Job description

Dash accelerates drug development. By fusing advanced automation-native lab workflows and integrated software into a unified platform, we provide the biopharma industry with the high-velocity, high-quality, data-driven development solutions required to get life-saving therapies to patients faster. Dash seeks to continuously improve industry KPIs and materially reduce the time and cost to bring a drug to market.

Company Summary:

We are building the infrastructure for modern drug development. We are moving beyond the manual, fragmented processes of traditional service providers by taking a technology-first approach to bioanalysis. Our platform is tech-enabled, automated, and GLP-compliant with the goal to industrialize the scientific workflows that act as bottlenecks in the industry. We deliver next-generation preclinical and clinical bioanalysis results with unprecedented speed and precision.

We are a team of builders operating at the intersection of biology, hardware, and code. This is an environment for scientists and engineers who are tired of the status quo and are ready to apply their skills to solve hard problems at scale. We don't just run assays, we architect the systems that will define the future of drug development.

We are a place where employees are stretched to do the best work of their career. We are looking for engineers, scientists, and biotechnicians who want to make an impact on the world and leverage their skills in an innovative way.

We are seeking a well-versed and detail-oriented Production Automation Specialist to provide automation expertise and oversee the day-to-day production side of our automated liquid handling platforms. In this role, you will bridge the gap between complex laboratory workflows and robust engineering. You will champion process improvements to help transition our lab into a highly industrialized, scaled production environment and address hardware/software troubleshooting in real-time to support lab technicians and scientists operating on Dash platform.

Key Responsibilities

• Production Oversight: Oversee and improve the high execution quality of the daily production workflows, ensuring client samples are processed efficiently and meet Dash's exceptional liquid handling quality standards.
• On-the-Floor Troubleshooting: Assist lab technicians in real-time to diagnose, troubleshoot, and resolve hardware and software bottlenecks as they arise on our automated systems.
• Continuous Industrialization: Proactively identify performance bottlenecks or workflow limitations on the floor. Suggest and implement data-driven process improvements to achieve a more industrialized, high-throughput, and reliable production lab.
• Team Guidance & Retraining: Partner with and mentor junior team members, ensuring thorough training on standard operating procedures and the platform's built-in safety features (such as barcode mask verification against expected tip types).
• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Act as a central floor liaison collaborating with scientists, software engineers, and hardware teams to ensure instrument capabilities continuously align with production throughput demands.

Qualifications & Skills

• Automation Platform Expertise: Deep, hands-on technical proficiency with common liquid handling platforms (specifically Hamilton STAR/Vantage instrumentation), alongside Agilent/BioTek devices (i.e. EL406 washer, Synergy NEO) and Thermo Fisher peripherals (i.e. KingfisherFlex and others).
• Biological Workflow Fluency: Strong familiarity with common laboratory applications and assay preparation, including but not limited to Ligand binding assays (ELISA/MSD), genomics (NGS/qPCR/ddPCR), and LCMS.
• Technical Aptitude: An intuitive understanding of hardware-software integration, logic-based automation tasks, and physical error recovery protocols on live instruments.
• Process Mindset: Exceptionally detailed and process-oriented. You thrive on structure, data integrity, and optimizing systems for maximum uptime.
• Education & Experience: Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Bioengineering, Biotechnology, Biology, or a related field with 5+ years of hands-on industry experience combined with proven experience managing, configuring, or troubleshooting lab automation in a fast-paced production or clinical setting.

Why Choose This Role?

This is a critical position at Dash Bio. You will have a direct hand in shaping the scalability of our core technology, ensuring our clients receive world-class liquid handling quality, and helping to build an industrialized lab reimagining what’s possible with revolutionized drug development cycle.

What We Offer

• Opportunity to work at the forefront of bioanalytical innovation.
• Collaborative and inclusive company culture.
• Competitive salary and comprehensive benefits package.
• Direct access to industry veterans and a supportive environment for professional growth.