Senior Principal Developer

Salary: £60,000 - 100,000 per year

Requirements:

• MSc in a quantitative or computational science, or equivalent.
• Experience as an R developer.
• Deep knowledge of data manipulation (tidyverse) and data visualization (ggplot2, plotly).
• Demonstrated ability to develop production-grade R packages, including comprehensive documentation and rigorous testing frameworks.
• Hands-on experience deploying and maintaining R applications in production environments.
• Highly proficient in Shiny app development and deployment.
• Deep experience in software development best practices, including virtual environments, git, CI/CD, and code review.
• Hands-on experience applying AI and agentic approaches to improve developer productivity of data-driven applications.
• Solution-oriented mindset with a collaborative spirit.
• Good written English.
• Good understanding of the drug development process.
• High-level understanding of the regulatory requirements for computer systems and tools.
• Knowledge of Quarto, workflow automation, or metadata-driven reporting.
• Participation in open-source projects within the pharmaceutical sector, such as those associated with R Consortium, pharmaverse, openpharma, or openstatware.

Responsibilities:

• Work as part of an interdisciplinary team to develop solutions and tools that enable study teams working on analyses and reporting activities in clinical trials.
• Work across the clinical reporting lifecycle to gain an appreciation of the user experience and partner with Product Owners to deliver progress in high-impact areas.
• Focus on enabling the use of open-source programming languages and tooling.
• Develop and maintain R packages that support data engineering, statistical analyses, automation, and reporting workflows for clinical trial teams.
• Design, build, and deploy Shiny applications for interactive dashboards and data exploration tools.
• Collaborate with statistical programmers, statisticians, and clinical reporting teams to understand requirements and translate them into efficient, reproducible code and tools.
• Apply AI responsibly to support product design and development, focusing on reliable, explainable, and impactful use in development workflows and solutions.
• Drive the rollout of tooling through demos, pilots, training, and support.
• Engage in the user experience of our users to identify and drive opportunities for continuous improvement and modernization.
• Role model best practices for data science and software development.
• Document tools and processes to support modernization in an inclusive manner.
• Engage with open-source communities to collaborate in external settings.

Technologies:

• AI
• CI/CD
• Git
• Support
• Machine Learning
• Python
• SQL
• pandas

More:

We are Novartis, working together to reimagine medicine and build an outstanding, inclusive environment with diverse teams representative of the patients and communities we serve. This is a full-time London-based role, with remote working considered and flexible hybrid working options where possible. The role sits in London, UK, and relocation support is not available. We offer a competitive rewards package that may include performance-based bonus eligibility, insurance plans, retirement plans, wellbeing resources, global recognition programs, and a minimum of 14 weeks paid parental leave. Our compensation is reviewed in line with relevant skills, competencies, and experience, and pay equity is a core principle of our employment policy.

last updated 36 week of 2026