---
title: 'Head/VP of Engineering at Valius Sciences'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/head-vp-of-engineering-valius-sciences-san-francisco-0nf568e2qf06'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-09-09'
---

# Head/VP of Engineering at Valius Sciences

- **Company:** Valius Sciences
- **Location:** San Francisco, CA
- **Compensation:** $250k–$350k
- **Employment:** full-time
- **Work type:** onsite
- **Posted:** 2026-04-28
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-09
- **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/valiussciences/584c4a8a-6c14-4181-bc1b-15352d16ac23

## Job description

Valius overview

At Valius, we believe that the future of cancer care will be defined by “maximalist” diagnostics: deep, comprehensive assessments of DNA, RNA, and protein designed to give patients and their care teams the best possible understanding of how their tumor works and what its vulnerabilities are.

We’re building the diagnostics and bioinformatics company to power this future, starting by applying this approach to patients with challenging cancers. In our first year, we worked with over 75 of these patients and, in many cases, identified plausible therapeutic targets which had not been discovered previously. This coming year, we’re on track to scale our patient volume significantly, all while bringing new diagnostic modalities (e.g., single-cell transcriptomics) and analytical approaches into clinical care for the very first time.

We’ve just raised a $13.5M seed round, led by 8VC and Basis Set Ventures, and are looking for people passionate about changing cancer care to join our growing team.

Head / VP of Engineering role

We’re hiring a strategic and experienced Head / VP of Engineering to lead the engineering function at Valius. You’ll be a player-coach: collaborating directly with the founders and the science team to oversee the technical direction of all of our internal and external facing products, and being hands-on in the engineering with your developers. You’ll also be responsible for building the engineering team, culture, and processes that will propel our growth.

This role will be expected to work out of our beautiful San Francisco office four days a week.

## What you’ll do

- Define and own technical strategy: Partner with the founding team to set the technical vision and roadmap across our internal and external applications, data infrastructure, and AI-powered product.
- Drive product delivery: Establish lightweight but effective engineering processes that help the team ship reliably without bureaucratic overhead.
- Lead and grow the engineering team: Directly manage our software engineers, establish a high-performance engineering culture, and lead hiring as the team grows.
- Stay hands-on: Contribute meaningfully to the codebase, including reviewing code, making architectural decisions, and rolling up your sleeves when needed.
- Own architecture and infrastructure: Make key decisions on system design, cloud infrastructure, data pipelines, and our security and compliance posture.
- Partner with computational biology: Work closely with our science team to develop tools that accelerate their work.
- Contribute across the company: Pitch in on cross-functional initiatives and bring an engineering perspective to strategic, company-level decisions.

## What you’ll bring

- 8+ years of software engineering experience, with at least 2-3 years in an engineering leadership role (tech lead, engineering manager, or equivalent)
- Track record of both hands-on technical execution and leading / mentoring engineers
- Strong product instincts and ability to collaborate with non-engineering stakeholders to shape roadmaps
- Strong foundation across the full stack, with particular depth in back-end systems, data infrastructure, and cloud architecture (Python, AWS/GCP, data pipelines)
- Experience making architectural decisions and owning them end-to-end
- Experience building and scaling engineering teams, including hiring
- Genuine excitement about working in a fast-moving, early-stage environment where the scope of the role will evolve
- Commitment to our patient-focused mission

Other nice to haves

- Experience in life sciences, genomics, or bioinformatics
- Experience working at an early-stage startup
- Background in data engineering or working with large datasets
- Experience integrating AI features in production applications
- Experience as an early engineering hire or founding engineer at a startup

## What we'll bring

- Competitive salary and equity compensation
- Generous refresh grants
- Comprehensive benefits (health, dental, vision, 401(k))
- Genuine investment in your professional development
- Fun, mission-driven team culture

## About Valius Sciences

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: Valius Sciences provides maximalist molecular diagnostic testing for cancer patients, mapping tumors across DNA, RNA, and protein layers to identify actionable therapeutic targets.
- **Entity Type**: Private (Seed/Series A – conflicting reports)
- **Headquarters**: San Francisco, United States
- **Founded**: 2025
- **Founders**: Edward Larkin, Claire Oldfield (COO), Sarah Hesse (Head of Translational Science)

## Core Business
- Primary industry/industries: Cancer diagnostics, precision oncology, molecular testing
- Target customers: B2C (cancer patients, especially those with rare, aggressive, or treatment-resistant cancers) and B2B (oncologists and care teams)
- Mission or purpose statement: To give every cancer patient — particularly those facing rare, aggressive, or treatment-resistant disease — access to the most comprehensive molecular understanding of their tumor and available treatments.

## Products & Services
- **Valius Maximalist Diagnostics Platform**: A comprehensive testing battery that includes whole genome sequencing, whole transcriptome (RNA) sequencing, single-cell RNA sequencing, spatial transcriptomics, high-plex protein staining (IHC), and ultra-sensitive ctDNA monitoring. The service identifies mutations, copy number changes, gene expression, pathway activation, tumor heterogeneity, immune microenvironment, resistance mechanisms, and actionable surface targets. Results are delivered with ongoing scientific partnership and an AI-powered, queryable data platform.

## Market Standing
- **Valuation/Market Cap**: Not disclosed
- **Key Metric**: Total funding — conflicting reports: $10M (Seed, per DefineVC and Tracxn) or $13.5M (per company blog). [definevc.com](https://www.definevc.com/insights/putting-the-patient-at-the-center-of-cancer-science-with-valius-sciences) / [valiussciences.com](https://www.valiussciences.com/) (blog post)
- **Notable Investors/Partners**: 8VC, Basis Set Ventures (seed round)
- **Growth Signals**: Raised funding in early 2026; has worked with patients across 25+ cancer types; early cases identified new drug targets not found by prior diagnostics; hiring across key roles (Computational Biologist, Translational Scientist, Software Engineer, Operations Lead).

## Competitive Advantages
- **Maximalist, multi-omics approach**: Covers DNA, RNA, and protein comprehensively rather than limited panel testing; leaves no stone unturned.
- **Ongoing scientific partnership**: Unlike standard PDF-report diagnostics, Valius provides dedicated scientists who meet regularly with patients and physicians, and data remains accessible and queryable forever via AI.
- **Patient-centric model**: Direct-pay service (pricing $50k–$150k with discounts); focuses on biologically plausible targets regardless of cancer type; supports clinical trial matching, single-patient INDs, and recurrence monitoring.
- **Top-tier team**: Founders combine operational discipline, commercial rigor, and deep scientific credibility.

## Strategic Focus
- Scale the platform to reach more patients with rare, aggressive, or recurrent cancers.
- Continue refining the AI-powered data platform for real-time querying and analysis.
- Expand partnerships with oncologists and treatment centers to integrate Valius findings into care pathways.

## Why Work Here
- **Mission-driven**: Direct, immediate impact on cancer patients’ treatment options.
- **Interdisciplinary culture**: Hires computational biologists, scientists, engineers, and clinicians who span disciplines and don’t fit neatly into boxes.
- **Cutting-edge tech**: Work with whole genome, single-cell, spatial, and proteomic data at scale.
- **Autonomy & ownership**: Small, focused team with front-line patient interaction.
- **Location**: San Francisco (likely office-first; remote/hybrid policy not explicitly stated). “Outlier” culture emphasized.
- **Open roles**: Computational Biologist, Translational Scientist, Software Engineer, Operations Lead (as of 2026).

## Sources
1. [Valius Sciences Website](https://www.valiussciences.com/)
2. [Valius Sciences Careers Page](https://www.valiussciences.com/careers)
3. [DefineVC Investment Blog](https://www.definevc.com/insights/putting-the-patient-at-the-center-of-cancer-science-with-valius-sciences)
4. [Tracxn Company Profile](https://tracxn.com/d/companies/valius/__spxuU3YvDbNRZwJnIIruRczc89b40XA-xktgbWeCXkI)
5. [Ashby Careers Portal](https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/valiussciences)

## Other roles at Valius Sciences

- [Director of Translational Science](https://feeny.ai/job/director-of-translational-science-valius-sciences-san-francisco-svfhd275hh5n) — San Francisco, CA
- [Clinical Translational Scientist](https://feeny.ai/job/clinical-translational-scientist-valius-sciences-san-francisco-rch03b5c4vrz) — San Francisco, CA
- [Computational Biologist](https://feeny.ai/job/computational-biologist-valius-sciences-san-francisco-9hh0dj4aa8eq) — San Francisco, CA