AI-Assisted Formulation Lead (KTP Associate)

The duties of the post will include:

• Developing a bespoke Large Language Model (LLM) and Agent capable of generating novel drug formulations.
• Training with limited proprietary data
• Designing a feedback-driven learning loop
• Ensuring clinical relevance and compliance
• Adapting open-source LLMs
• Building a privacy-preserving recommendation system
• Deploying outputs within a real-world pharmaceutical infrastructure
• Communicating and developing relationships with key stakeholders

These duties are a guide to the work that the post holder will initially be required to undertake. They may be changed from time to time to meet changing circumstances.

Benefits

As a KTP Associate, the post will offer the following benefits:

• A personal development budget of £4,333 (exclusive of salary).
• Management training and mentoring by an Innovate UK KTP Adviser.
• An interesting and challenging role, with exposure to a variety of stakeholders.
• Full access to university resources to complete the project.
• World-leading Academic and Company project supervision, with project support by a dedicated, sector leading KTP Office.

Person Specification

Qualifications /Training

The successful candidate should have the following:

Essential

• A minimum of an MSc in Computer Science, Data Science, Artificial Intelligence or a closely related discipline (or equivalent professional experience)

Desirable

• PhD in Computer Science, Data Science, Artificial Intelligence or a related discipline
• Relevant accredited certification in Machine Learning, Generative AI, or related fields

Experience/Knowledge

The successful candidate should have the following:

Essential

• Demonstrable hands-on experience developing and deploying LLM-based systems
• Experience adapting or fine-tuning open-source LLMs
• Experience designing and implementing RAG pipelines
• Strong understanding of evaluation methodologies and hallucination mitigation in generative systems
• Experience in data preparation, structuring, and knowledge base construction for AI systems
• Understanding of security, privacy, and responsible AI principles

Desirable

• Experience working in healthcare or regulated environments
• Experience collaborating with domain experts in scientific or pharmaceutical contexts
• Experience in working with Agentic Skills and setting up relevant Agentic systems

Skills/Abilities

The successful candidate should have the following:

Essential

• High level of programming ability (particularly in Python and ML/AI frameworks)
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills
• Commitment to quality assurance, reproducibility, and documentation
• Ability to translate scientific or technical requirements into robust AI system design
• Excellent communication skills with an ability to convey complex matters to a variety of audiences and key stakeholders

Desirable

• Capability to evaluate and validate AI-generated formulations
• Ability to write high-quality scientific and technical documentation, including contributions to peer-reviewed publications

Other

• Can meet the requirements of UK ‘right to work’ legislation*

This project will be comprised of two distinct but interdependent innovations / workstreams. Workstream 2 will develop and train a bespoke LLM agent capable of generating and proposing novel formulation recipes, as well as suggesting improvements to existing formulations, drawing on Roseway’s proprietary database and licensed external libraries.

The AI-Assisted Formulation Lead will work in parallel with another KTP associate based at Roseway Labs, who will be responsible for Scheduling Optimisation (Workstream 1).

Both workstreams will be integrated into the company’s software platform, eRoseway, embedding new technical capabilities and enabling future automation across other business functions. The project is innovative in its application of AI and optimisation techniques within a regulated pharmaceutical setting and will position Roseway as a leader in tech-enabled compounding pharmacy.