About Apheris
At Apheris, we are building the future of how AI is applied in pharmaceutical R&D.
We enable leading pharmaceutical teams to discover and develop drugs faster. We host the industry’s largest federated data networks for drug discovery AI, spanning co-folding, ADMET, and antibody developability.
Across these networks, models are trained on proprietary industry datasets to achieve higher performance and broader applicability while keeping data control and IP protected. We deliver these superior models through drug discovery applications that enable teams to run them at scale, further customize them, and integrate them into existing R&D workflows.
- AI Structural Biology (AISB) Network: Eight top-20 pharma companies collaborate in the field of co-folding, structure-based binding affinity predictions and antibody design.
- ADMET Network: Five top-50 pharma and biotechs collaborate to improve small-molecule property prediction and expand to further drug modalities (e.g., PROTACs).
- Antibody Developability Network: Pharma partners collaborate to federate historical and purpose-built antibody developability datasets for secure ML training, without data leaving each partner’s environment.
About the role
We are looking for a Senior Product Designer to take ownership of the UI/UX across Apheris’ growing portfolio of scientific applications. As we increasingly deliver end-user products to drug discovery teams, great design is becoming critical to ensuring our tools are intuitive, efficient, and trusted by scientists in their day-to-day work.
In this role, you will design products used primarily by medicinal chemists and computational chemists. You will invest deeply in understanding how these users think, work, and make decisions, and translate that understanding into interfaces that feel natural within real drug discovery workflows. An important aspect of the role is making advanced ML outputs interpretable and actionable, helping users build confidence in model behavior and data-rich results.
You will work closely with the product team and domain experts to shape product direction from early discovery through to production. This is a hands-on role for a designer who enjoys rapid prototyping, iterative feedback loops, and taking accountability for turning complex technical capabilities into clear, usable products that deliver real value.
What you will do
- Own the end-to-end UX and UI design across multiple Apheris products, with a strong focus on usability for drug discovery scientists
- Work closely with the Product team and scientific stakeholders to translate product strategy, user needs, and technical constraints into effective design solutions
- Develop wireframes and quick prototypes to test concepts with external users and domain experts, and iterate rapidly based on feedback
- Design and refine production-ready interfaces that balance scientific complexity with clarity and ease of use
- Actively engage with users to understand their workflows and validate design decisions
- Contribute to the design of flagship applications such as ApherisFold, new products in the ADMET space, other external-facing technical tools, and the Apheris website
- Continuously evaluate and improve the user experience through testing, iteration, and close collaboration with product, engineering and science teams
What we expect from you
- Strong experience as a Product Designer working on complex data-driven or AI-empowered products, with scientific or drug discovery users
- A user-first mindset, with the ability to deeply understand specialist workflows and design interfaces that align with how users actually work
- Proven ability to move from low-fidelity concepts to polished, production-ready designs
- Experience using AI-powered prototyping tools and a broad suite of high-fidelity product design tools to rapidly explore, validate, and ship high-quality experiences
- Comfort working in fast-moving environments, iterating quickly and making pragmatic trade-offs
- Strong communication skills, ability to clearly explain design decisions to both technical and non-technical stakeholders
- Ownership mentality: you take accountability for design quality and are proactive in identifying and solving UX problems
- A portfolio that demonstrates thoughtful UX decisions, not just visual polish
- Experience running user interviews, usability testing, or design validation with external users
- Familiarity with drug discovery, life sciences, or chemistry-related workflows
- Exposure to complex enterprise or B2B products
- Experience designing tools for scientific, technical, or data-heavy domains
Nice to have
- Experience designing interfaces for data exploration, visualization, and analysis-heavy workflows
- Experience with AI-enabled products and how they are experienced by end users
- Familiarity with workflows in data science, machine learning, or computational research
- Experience contributing to or shaping a design system
What we offer you
- Industry-competitive compensation, including early-stage virtual share options
- Remote-first working – work where you work best, whether from home or a co-working space near you
- Great suite of benefits, including a wellbeing budget, mental health benefits, a work-from-home budget, a co-working stipend and a learning and development budget
- Generous holiday allowance
- Office Days at our Berlin HQ or a different European location (3x a year)
- A fun, diverse team of mission-driven individuals with experience across leading organizations and a drive to see AI and ML used for good
- High impact, significant ownership, and the opportunity to shape how Apheris scales its people and culture over the next phase of growth
Logistics
Our interview process is split into three phases:
- Initial Screening: If your application aligns with our requirements, we’ll invite you to a 30‑minute video call to explore mutual fit. This conversation is an opportunity for you to learn more about us and the role, while the interviewer will focus on your relevant experience and skills. You’ll also have time to ask any questions you may have about the company or position.
- Presentation & Deep Dive: Prior to the session, you’ll complete a short, offline design assessment and prepare a case study. During the follow‑up session, you’ll present your case study to our team. Our team will engage with you to understand your problem‑solving approach, technical depth, and how your past experiences align with the challenges of the role.
- Final Interview: In the final round, you’ll meet several team members you’re likely to work with closely. This conversation focuses on our culture, collaboration style, and what it’s like to be part of the team day‑to‑day. In the second part you'll meet with one of our founder, talking about our culture and collaboration style."