--- title: 'Associate Director/Director, Frontier and AI Product Counsel at Lila Sciences' canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/associate-director-director-frontier-and-ai-product-counsel-lila-sciences-7z94cshd3d66' type: 'job' last_seen: '2026-10-30' --- # Associate Director/Director, Frontier and AI Product Counsel at Lila Sciences - **Company:** Lila Sciences - **Location:** Cambridge, MA / San Francisco, CA - **Compensation:** $232k–$360k - **Posted:** 2026-10-28 - **Last confirmed live:** 2026-10-30 - **Apply:** https://job-boards.greenhouse.io/lilasciences/jobs/4429017009 ## Job description ## Your Impact at LILA As Associate Director/Director, Frontier and AI Product Counsel at Lila Sciences, you will be the dedicated legal partner to the teams building Scientific Superintelligence™ — our AI research organization, our AI Science Factory™ platform, and the data, safety, and security functions that support them. You will own the legal questions that come with training frontier models on scientific data and running experiments autonomously: where data comes from and what we can do with it, how rights are allocated when we discover something alongside a partner, what we can publish or open-source, and how we build, evaluate, and release capable systems responsibly. This is deliberately a build role, not a maintenance role. Much of this work has no settled precedent and no off-the-shelf playbook — you will frequently be designing the framework rather than applying one. You'll partner daily with scientists, ML researchers, platform engineers, and our safety and security teams, and closely with our privacy, commercial, and go-to-market colleagues as the platform is deployed, and you'll be the person who translates between technical reality and legal risk in both directions. This role reports to the Vice President, Associate General Counsel, Product and is scoped for an experienced attorney with 7–12 years of experience who wants to work at the intersection of law, AI, and science, and who is energized rather than unsettled by novel questions. You should be comfortable with ambiguity, opinionated about risk, and willing to sit with a research team long enough to actually understand what they're building. ## What You'll Be Building Data and model development - Advise research and data teams on permissible data usage across the training pipeline, and build the provenance and acquisition frameworks that govern what goes into Lila's models - Serve as a subject matter expert on copyright, licensing, privacy, and contractual restrictions as applied to training data — public, licensed, synthetic, open-source, and partner-contributed alike - Support structuring and negotiation of data licensing, material transfer, consortium, and research collaboration agreements with academic, clinical, and industry partners, including how rights in data, models, and derived outputs are allocated Release and disclosure - Advise on release decisions for models, agents, tools, and datasets, including open-weight strategy and the application of open-source licenses to incoming and outgoing code, data, and model artifacts - Coordinate legal readiness for model and platform launches — model documentation and system cards, capability evaluations, and review of pre-release and internal-only models - Support publication and disclosure review, balancing scientific openness against partner obligations and safety considerations - Counsel research teams on research design, data collection and sharing, external collaborations, and program launches, including alignment, interpretability, and societal-impact work as those functions develop - Counsel platform teams on legal considerations for autonomous experimentation and agentic systems Safety, security, and dual-use - Partner with our AI Safety and AI Security teams on the legal dimensions of technical mitigations, evaluations, red-teaming, and misuse prevention, including vendor engagements and external collaborations - Advise on dual-use and biosecurity considerations arising from autonomous chemistry and biology, including screening, access controls, and disclosure - Help operationalize Lila's safety framework as capabilities scale: how capability thresholds translate into evaluations, access controls, documented mitigations, and release decisions - Serve as a first-line contact for safety and security escalations, and build the playbooks that let that response scale Regulation and infrastructure - Track and translate the regulatory landscape that bears on our work: emerging AI regimes (EU AI Act, US state AI laws), health and research data rules, human-subject and biospecimen requirements, and export controls - Support compute and infrastructure arrangements, including cloud and datacenter agreements, cross-border data transfers, and data localization - Represent Lila in regulatory inquiries, and contribute to industry and academic work on data governance and safety norms for AI-driven science Building the function - Design the frameworks, templates, and self-serve guidance that put legal judgment in the hands of the teams who need it, and use AI tools aggressively to extend the reach of a small team ## What You'll Need to Succeed - J.D. and membership in at least one U.S. state bar in good standing - 7–12 years of legal experience, with substantial time in-house at a technology, AI, or life sciences company, ideally spanning both research-facing and product- or customer-facing counseling - Depth in at least two of: copyright and IP, data licensing and provenance, privacy and data protection, AI regulation, model launch and deployment counseling, or research and collaboration transactions — and the appetite to get up to speed fast on the rest - Genuine technical fluency: you can hold your own in a conversation about how models are trained, evaluated, and deployed, you can read a research protocol without needing it translated, and you can spot the legal issue inside a technical design - Sound judgment under uncertainty, and the ability to give clear, practical advice on questions where the law has not caught up, including when to be flexible and when to hold a line - A strong sense of ownership and the instinct to build cross-functional relationships, so teams bring you in while decisions are still open rather than after them - Excellent written communication — you can draft a policy, a framework, or a whitepaper that non-lawyers will actually use - Comfort operating outside your areas of expertise, wearing many hats, and moving at startup speed without losing rigor Bonus Points For - A STEM background or advanced degree, particularly in biology, chemistry, materials, or computer science - Experience advising AI research teams on training data, model development, or model release decisions - Experience advising on enterprise or API product deployment — data governance, tenancy and access controls, connectors, or agentic features - Experience coordinating model launches, or drafting model documentation, system cards, or capability evaluation write-ups - Experience with AI-generated invention and inventorship questions, or patent strategy in an AI-driven discovery setting - Familiarity with dual-use, biosecurity, export control, or CFIUS considerations - Experience supporting academic collaborations, consortium agreements, or federally funded research - An academic or publishing background, or depth in open-source and data licensing - Experience engaging directly with regulators or standards bodies - Experience building legal infrastructure and scalable processes from scratch - Enthusiasm for transforming legal practice through AI and data-driven tools ## Compensation We offer competitive base compensation with bonus potential and generous early-stage equity. Your final offer will reflect your background, expertise, and expected impact. U.S. Benefits. Full-time U.S. employees receive a comprehensive benefits program including medical, dental, and vision coverage; employer-paid life and disability insurance; flexible time off with generous company wide holidays; paid parental leave; an educational assistance program; commuter benefits, including bike share memberships for office based employees; and a company subsidized lunch program. International Benefits. Full-time employees outside the U.S. receive a comprehensive benefits program tailored to their region. USD salary ranges apply only to U.S.-based positions; international salaries are set to local market. Expected Base Salary Range $232,000—$360,000 USD ## About LILA Lila Sciences is building Scientific Superintelligence™ to solve humankind's greatest challenges. We believe science is the most inspiring frontier for AI. Rather than hard-coding expert knowledge into tools, LILA builds systems that can learn for themselves. LILA combines advanced AI models with proprietary AI Science Factory™ instruments into an operating system for science that executes the entire scientific method autonomously, accelerating discovery at unprecedented speed, scale, and impact across medicine, materials, and energy. Learn more at www.lila.ai. Guided by our core values of truth, trust, curiosity, grit, and velocity, we move with startup speed while tackling problems of historic importance. If this sounds like an environment you'd love to work in, even if you don't meet every qualification listed above, we encourage you to apply. We’re All In Lila Sciences is committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, gender identity or Veteran status. Information you provide during your application process will be handled in accordance with our [Candidate Privacy Policy](https://www.lila.ai/candidate-privacy-policy-notice). A Note to Agencies Lila Sciences does not accept unsolicited resumes from any source other than candidates. The submission of unsolicited resumes by recruitment or staffing agencies to Lila Sciences or its employees is strictly prohibited unless contacted directly by Lila Science’s internal Talent Acquisition team. Any resume submitted by an agency in the absence of a signed agreement will automatically become the property of Lila Sciences, and Lila Sciences will not owe any referral or other fees with respect thereto. ## About Lila Sciences ## Company Overview - **One-liner**: Lila Sciences is building the world’s first Scientific Superintelligence platform and autonomous lab, using AI to autonomously generate hypotheses, design and run experiments, and learn from results in real time across life sciences, chemistry, materials, energy, and defense. - **Entity Type**: Private (Privately Held) – Series A, Seed, and Grant funding rounds - **Headquarters**: Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States - **Founded**: Not publicly available (first funding round was Seed in March 2025) - **Founders**: Not publicly available (founded within Flagship Pioneering’s ecosystem) ## Core Business - **Primary industry**: AI-powered scientific discovery and autonomous laboratory platforms - **Target customers**: B2B – research organizations, biotech, pharmaceutical, energy, materials, aerospace, and defense companies - **Mission**: “Scientific Superintelligence to solve humankind’s greatest challenges” – accelerating discovery across medicine, materials, energy, and defense ## Products & Services - **LILA Platform (Scientific Superintelligence)**: An AI model and operating system that autonomously executes the entire scientific method – generating hypotheses, designing experiments, running them in physical labs, and learning from results in real time. - **AI Science Factory™ Instruments**: Proprietary hardware and robotics that serve as the “body” of the platform, enabling automated experimentation at scale. - **Domain-specific applications**: Tailored solutions for biotech (drug discovery, protein engineering), therapeutics (mRNA, antibodies, cell therapies), energy & environment (clean fuels, catalysis, critical minerals), advanced materials, chemicals, aerospace & defense, and oil & gas. ## Market Standing - **Valuation**: Not disclosed - **Key Metric**: Total funding – USD $550.7M (as of LinkedIn data) - Seed Round (March 2025): $200M led by Flagship Pioneering - Series A (September 2025): $235M led by Braidwell and Collective Global Management - Series A (November 2025): $115M led by NVentures (NVIDIA) - Grant (January 2026): $671,400 led by ARIA - **Notable Investors/Partners**: Flagship Pioneering, NVIDIA (NVentures), Braidwell, Collective Global Management, ARIA - **Growth Signals**: Named #25 on the 2026 CNBC Disruptor 50 List; headcount of 308 employees (monthly growth +10.6%); 122 active job postings; operates in 6 countries (US, UK, Canada, Poland, Spain, Germany) ## Competitive Advantages - **Proprietary AI model** that consistently outperforms other models across scientific domains in complex analysis and reasoning. - **Autonomous physical labs** that close the loop between AI hypothesis generation and real-world experimentation. - **“Team of Teams” operating model** enabling startup speed at scale while maintaining radical transparency and high trust. - **General platform approach** (inspired by Rich Sutton’s “Bitter Lesson”) rather than narrow domain-specific tools, allowing broad applicability. ## Strategic Focus - Accelerating discovery across medicine, materials, energy, and defense - Scaling the autonomous science platform to more industries and use cases - Building “Scientific Superintelligence” that can tackle humanity’s greatest challenges - Continued investment in AI research, robotics, and lab automation ## Why Work Here - **Culture**: Emphasizes velocity, trust, curiosity, truth, and grit. “Think freely, prove precisely.” A high-trust, mission-driven environment where scientists and engineers work side by side. - **Remote/Hybrid/Office**: Roles are listed in Cambridge, MA; San Francisco, CA; and London, UK. Physical lab presence suggests significant on-site work, but some roles may offer flexibility. Policy not explicitly stated. - **Notable perks/engineering culture**: Opportunity to work at the frontier of AI and scientific discovery; collaboration with world-renowned experts; access to cutting-edge robotics and AI infrastructure; strong emphasis on learning and teaching (“generous teachers and eager learners”). ## Sources 1. [lila.ai](https://www.lila.ai/) 2. [lila.ai/about](https://www.lila.ai/about) 3. [lila.ai/open-roles](https://www.lila.ai/open-roles) 4. [LinkedIn - Lila Sciences](https://www.linkedin.com/company/lila-sciences) 5. [Greenhouse Job Board](https://job-boards.greenhouse.io/lilasciences/jobs/4246302009) ## Other roles at Lila Sciences - [Co-Op, Editorial Content](https://feeny.ai/job/co-op-editorial-content-lila-sciences-cambridge-wxs4v4cxc0av) — Cambridge, MA - [Co-Op, Bayesian Methods for Complex Decision Making](https://feeny.ai/job/co-op-bayesian-methods-for-complex-decision-making-lila-sciences-cambridge-ndt2w02kgvj2) — Cambridge, MA / San Francisco, CA - [Co-Op, SCADA Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/co-op-scada-engineer-lila-sciences-cambridge-hv28gbacp62z) — Cambridge, MA - [Co-Op, Structuring Scientific Data for Discovery](https://feeny.ai/job/co-op-structuring-scientific-data-for-discovery-lila-sciences-cambridge-57tgh64e8y0k) — Cambridge, MA / San Francisco, CA - [Co-Op, Electron Microscopy](https://feeny.ai/job/co-op-electron-microscopy-lila-sciences-cambridge-nj1aaxqp55xm) — Cambridge, MA - [Co-Op, Finance](https://feeny.ai/job/co-op-finance-lila-sciences-cambridge-8p0szx7ty94c) — Cambridge, MA - [Co-Op, Robot Perception & State Estimation](https://feeny.ai/job/co-op-robot-perception-state-estimation-lila-sciences-cambridge-yznrym7yenxa) — Cambridge, MA - [Co-Op, AI Nucleic Acid Design](https://feeny.ai/job/co-op-ai-nucleic-acid-design-lila-sciences-san-francisco-jna9hpj3dsxn) — San Francisco, CA - [Co-Op, Reaction Prediction & Benchmarking](https://feeny.ai/job/co-op-reaction-prediction-benchmarking-lila-sciences-cambridge-yc1ec2e9sfb4) — Cambridge, MA / San Francisco, CA - [Co-Op, Agentic Simulations for Materials Science](https://feeny.ai/job/co-op-agentic-simulations-for-materials-science-lila-sciences-cambridge-z1m0175gttp2) — Cambridge, MA / San Francisco, CA