Director, Life Science & Biopharma Accounts

About us

Owkin is an agentic AI company pioneering Biological Artificial Superintelligence to solve problems in biology where human researchers alone have failed.
Owkin builds K Pro - an AI scientist for pharmaceutical research and strategic decision-making. K Pro orchestrates a suite of AI skills and tools to decode complex biology, accelerate research, and dramatically increase productivity.
K Pro is built on Owkin’s unrivalled multimodal patient data network, state-of-the-art AI for biology and a decade of experience working with pharmaceutical partners.

The position is based from our New York offices or remotely in the North East of USA

Please submit your CV in English

About the role:

Owkin is looking for a sales professional to join our US commercial team, with a focus across pharmaceutical companies, biotech companies, CROs, VC/PE firms and selected investor-backed life sciences organizations.

This is a new business development focused, individual contributor role, perfect for someone who enjoys creating commercial opportunities from the ground up while working closely with colleagues across Sales, Partnerships, Technical Sales, Product, Delivery and Marketing. You will identify and build relationships with scientific, digital, innovation, commercial, and executive stakeholders, and guide complex opportunities from first conversation through contract signature.

You’ll be selling solutions more than simply a technology platform. Your role will be to help customers understand how K Pro can support their challenges in areas such as drug discovery, translational research, clinical development, and portfolio decision-making. In turn, your customer insight will help the wider commercial team recognise market demand and refine our proposition, messaging, and approach.

You will be able to engage credibly with life sciences customers, ask the right questions, identify value quickly, and move opportunities forward to conclusion. Every success moves you towards winning the large partnership opportunities that Owkin is achieving with K Pro. 

In particular, you will:

• Own a focused portfolio of North American target accounts, aligned with the wider sales strategy and team priorities.

• Generate and qualify pipeline within your portfolio through proactive prospecting, referrals, networks, events, and account-based activity.

• Open and develop relationships with senior stakeholders across pharmaceutical, biotech, CRO and VC/PE organizations.

• Own the full sales cycle, from qualification and discovery through proposal, negotiation and close.

• Lead consultative conversations that uncover scientific, operational, and business priorities.

• Translate customer needs into clear proposals, business cases, pilots, feasibility studies, or broader Owkin K Pro opportunities.

• Work with Technical Sales, Product, Delivery, Legal, Finance, and Marketing to shape practical solutions and move deals forward.

• Build internal champions and maintain momentum across complex, multi-stakeholder sales cycles.

• Keep CRM activity, pipeline, and forecasts accurate.

• Bring customer feedback and market intelligence back to Sales, Marketing, Product, and leadership.

• Help refine our positioning, target segments, sales materials, and commercial approach as the North American market develops.

About you

Required qualifications / experience:

• A track record in winning new business within complex B2B sales, strategic account development, or consultative selling environments.

• Experience in proactively creating pipelines and closing opportunities with multiple stakeholders.

• Familiarity with life sciences, healthcare, technology, data, AI, SaaS, research services, or other technically complex environments; an established platform of connections in these arenas would bring a significant advantage.

• A demonstrated ability to engage credibly with both scientific and business audiences.

• Strong prospecting, discovery, qualification, presentation, negotiation, and value-selling skills.

• Commercial judgment and the ability to identify where Owkin can create differentiated value.

• Curiosity, resilience, and the ability to operate with autonomy in a fast-moving company.

• Rigorous efficiency in how you plan, prioritise and execute your sales and development activities.

• Experience using Salesforce or a similar CRM, with sound forecasting and pipeline discipline.

• Willingness to travel within the US and internationally as needed.

Preferred qualifications/bonus:

Experience in at least one of the following would be advantageous:

• Pharmaceutical R&D, biotech, CROs, AI or data platforms, drug discovery, clinical development, biomedical research, investment or PE/VC backed life sciences firms.

• An academic background in life sciences, technology, or business is welcome but not essential.

What success could look like in the first 3, 6 to 9 months

• Clear insight into customer needs, competitive differentiation, and the strongest use cases for Owkin and, in particular, K Pro.

• A focused portfolio of target accounts, a qualified pipeline aligned with team priorities and a plan of priorities and engagement tactics.

• Rekindled existing connections and built new relationships leading to commercial opportunities across priority customer segments.

• Early wins through pilots, feasibility studies, or broader solution engagements.

This is an opportunity to join a high-performing commercial team at an important stage in K Pro’s development. You will have the autonomy to build relationships and create opportunities within your portfolio, while working closely with colleagues across Sales, Partnerships, Product, Technical Sales, Delivery, and Marketing to develop the strongest approach for our customers.

Salary and Benefits:

Owkin uses a compensation framework that is externally benchmarked and internally leveled. This framework assesses each role based on its expected autonomy, impact, and responsibility. The final compensation alignment will be determined by role level appointed, which will be assessed and confirmed through the in-depth interview process.

Competitive salary & excellent benefits package include:

• OTE (On-Target Earnings) - Director Level: In the range of $260,000 (made up of base salary + performance-based bonus)

• Equity Options

• Comprehensive Benefits:

  • Health insurance (individual & family),

  • 401(k) retirement plan, and

  • generous paid time off (35 days annually, in addition to state and federal holidays).

• Flexible Spending Accounts: To support your health and financial well-being.

#LI-HB1

What we offer

• Flexible work organization

• Friendly and informal working environment

• Opportunity to work with an international team with high technical and scientific backgrounds

Recruitment Process & Security

• Please complete the form and submit your CV.

• Owkin is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, sex, gender, sexual orientation, age, color, religion, national origin, protected veteran status or on the basis of disability.

• Owkin is a great place to work. As a coveted workplace we are, unfortunately, vulnerable to recruitment phishing scams. We urge all job seekers and candidates to be wary of potential scams. Most of these have individuals posing as representatives of prominent companies, including Owkin, with the aim of obtaining personal, sensitive, or financial information from applicants. These scams prey upon an individual’s desire to obtain a job and can sometimes “feel” like a genuine recruitment process. Some red flags are identified below. Should you encounter a recruitment process that claims to be for Owkin but is not consistent with the below, please do not provide any personal or financial information:

• Legitimate Owkin recruitment processes include communication with candidates through recognized professional networks, such as LinkedIn.

• Communication is always through an official Owkin email address (from the @ owkin.com domain), over the phone or through our applicant tracking system (Ashby).

• The Owkin talent team do use platforms such as LinkedIn, however if you have any concern or doubt about this contact, please ask for them to send an email from @ Owkin.com .

• The Owkin talent team will not solicit personal data from candidates during the application phase including, but not limited to, date of birth, social security numbers, or bank account information;

• Legitimate Owkin interviews may be conducted over the phone, in person, or via an approved enterprise videoconferencing service (Google Meets). They will not occur via Signal, Telegram or Messenger

• Owkin offers of employment are based on merit and only extended once a candidate has interviewed with members of the talent and hiring team. Offers will be extended both verbally and in written format.

If you think that you have been a victim of fraud,

• Check the identity of the talent team on LinkedIn

• Check our senior team on our website

• Check the existence of the position on our website:

• Notify Owkin's recruitment unit at this address View email address on us.fitly.work

• contact the following authorities:

  • [FR]

  • [UK]

  • [US]