Life Sciences Growth Director

About the Role

The Life Sciences Growth Director owns revenue generation for Synapticure’s Research business lines, with primary focus on Clinical Research and Real-World Evidence (RWE) offerings sold into pharmaceutical and biotechnology partners. This is a hands-on, quota-carrying role: sourcing, qualifying, shaping, and closing research engagements with sponsors, and expanding them over time.

Beyond direct pharma sales, the role extends into the broader research funding ecosystem - research-granting and advocacy foundations (e.g., The Michael J. Fox Foundation, ALS Association, Alzheimer’s Association, Huntington’s Disease Society of America) and contract research organizations (CROs), which represent both customers and channel partners.

This role is also expected to contribute meaningfully to what we sell, not just how much. The Director will work with clinical, data, and operations leadership to shape the design, packaging, and pricing of Synapticure’s research services and products, bringing market signal from live deals back into product strategy.

The Day to Day

Sales Execution - Research Business Lines (Primary)

• Carry and deliver against an annual bookings and revenue target for Clinical Research and RWE services sold to pharmaceutical and biotechnology partners.
• Build and maintain a qualified pipeline through prospecting, outbound targeting of sponsor teams (clinical development, medical affairs, HEOR/RWE, patient recruitment, data science, and neuroscience therapeutic area leadership), conference-based sourcing, and expansion within existing accounts.
• Lead the full deal cycle - discovery, solutioning, proposal and SOW development, pricing, negotiation, and close - coordinating internal subject-matter experts as needed.
• Develop account plans for priority sponsors, including stakeholder mapping across therapeutic areas and functions, and multi-year expansion paths from initial engagement to enterprise relationship.
• Partner with clinical operations, data, and finance teams to scope engagements accurately and price them to protect margin and deliverability.
• Maintain disciplined CRM hygiene, accurate forecasting, and clear pipeline reporting to the SVP and executive team.
• Represent Synapticure at industry conferences, sponsor meetings, and partner forums.
• In scope where appropriate: sales of Synapticure’s laboratory and diagnostic services, either standalone or as a component of broader research engagements.

Foundations, CROs, and the Broader Research Ecosystem

• Build and manage relationships with research-granting and advocacy foundations as funders, co-sponsors, and collaborators on research programs and registries.
• Identify and pursue grant-funded and foundation-sponsored research opportunities, coordinating internally on responses to RFPs, RFAs, and grant submissions.
• Develop partnership and channel relationships with CROs - positioning Synapticure as a site network, patient-access partner, RWE data partner, or decentralized-trial delivery partner within sponsor programs.
• Track the funding landscape across our disease areas to identify where Synapticure’s capabilities align with emerging research priorities.

Product Strategy and Formulation for Research Services

• Serve as the voice of the market in the design and refinement of Synapticure’s research offerings - translating sponsor and foundation requirements into service definitions, deliverables, and commercial models.
• Partner with clinical, data, and product leadership to develop new research products and packaged offerings, including scope definition, pricing models, and go-to-market positioning.
• Build and maintain sales-enabling assets: capability decks, service one-pagers, case studies, proposal templates, and pricing frameworks.
• Provide structured competitive and market intelligence on how sponsors are buying clinical research and RWE services, and where Synapticure is differentiated.

Cross-Functional Collaboration

• Work closely with clinical, operations, data, legal, and finance teams to ensure sold work is deliverable, contracted appropriately, and successfully transitioned to delivery.
• Contribute to the Life Sciences team’s overall commercial strategy, target account prioritization, and annual planning.

Minimum Qualifications

• Direct pharma/life sciences experience - either selling services into pharmaceutical or biotechnology companies, or working within a pharma/biotech organization in a relevant function (sales, medical affairs, HEOR/RWE, external innovation, or similar).
• 8+ years of professional experience, including 5+ years in a commercial, business development, or partnership-facing role.
• Demonstrated track record of closing complex, consultative, multi-stakeholder deals with pharma or biotech buyers.
• Working fluency in the clinical research and/or real-world evidence landscape: study designs, sponsor decision-making, budgets and contracting cycles, and the roles of CROs, sites, and data partners.
• Ability to translate ambiguous customer needs into concrete, scopeable service offerings.
• Excellent written and verbal communication, with comfort presenting to senior sponsor and foundation stakeholders.
• Willingness and ability to travel up ~25% travel for conferences and partner meetings.

Preferred Qualifications

• Working knowledge of pharmaceutical science and clinical care concepts. Comfort with drug development phases and endpoints, mechanisms of action, biomarkers and diagnostics, and how neurological conditions are diagnosed, staged, and managed in practice, sufficient to hold a credible conversation with clinical and medical stakeholders.
• Experience in neurology, neurodegenerative disease, or rare disease.
• Experience selling or delivering decentralized/virtual clinical trial services, patient recruitment and retention services, registries, or RWE/RWD offerings.
• Existing relationships with sponsor research and medical affairs teams, advocacy foundations, or CROs.
• Experience contributing to service design, pricing, or product strategy in a growth-stage healthcare or life sciences company.
• Experience selling into a market where the buyer set spans commercial, medical, and research budgets.

What Success Looks Like

• First 90 days: Ramped on Synapticure’s research capabilities and differentiators; account plans built for the top priority sponsors; active pipeline sourced. Engaged and making progress on a handful of deals already in-flight which will be transitioned to this person.
• First 6 months: First 1-3 independently sourced and closed research engagements; foundation and CRO relationship map established.
• First 12 months: Consistent achievement against bookings target; at least one new or materially reworked research offering brought to market with measurable pipeline attached.