Process Engineer, Fermentation and Upstream

Position Purpose

Owns the biological front end of the process, from raw material preparation and saccharification through seed train and production fermentation, and is the technical bridge between the laboratory process and the plant.

Key Responsibilities

• Own the fermentation process description, operating envelope and batch recipe, and translate it into control system sequences and operating procedures.
• Establish media preparation, sterilization, seed train propagation and inoculation procedures, and verify sterile boundary integrity.
• Own biomass feedstock handling and saccharification operations, including enzyme dosing and hydrolysis control.
• Set and monitor critical process parameters covering temperature, pH, dissolved oxygen, agitation, aeration and feed profile.
• Analyze batch data for yield, titer, productivity and contamination events, and drive corrective and improvement actions.
• Support commissioning of fermenters, sterilizers, air filtration, and clean in place and steam in place systems.
• Interface with the technology partner team on process transfer, scale up questions and troubleshooting.
• Train operators on fermentation fundamentals and contamination control discipline.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's or master's degree in chemical engineering, biochemical engineering, bioprocess engineering or microbiology.
• Five or more years of industrial fermentation experience at pilot scale or larger.
• Practical command of sterile technique, contamination investigation and clean in place validation.
• Strong batch data analysis skills.

Preferred Qualifications

• Organic acid fermentation experience.
• Scale up experience from pilot to commercial fermenters.
• Reading knowledge of Mandarin for technical exchange with the partner team.