PCQI - Quality & Food Safety Manager

PCQI - Quality & Food Safety Manager

About us:

Wildtype is on a mission to create the cleanest, most sustainable seafood on the planet, starting with sushi-grade salmon. We’re pioneering cellular agriculture to protect wild species and our oceans, and to reverse trends of global food insecurity. Wildtype will provide consumers with a new option for real seafood that provides the same nutritional benefits as the most pristine wild-caught fish, without common contaminants such as mercury, microplastics, antibiotics, or pesticides.

We were founded in 2016 by Aryé Elfenbein (Chief Scientist), a cardiologist and molecular biologist, and Justin Kolbeck (CEO), a former US diplomat who served in Pakistan and Afghanistan, in an effort to solve one of the world’s biggest problems: how to feed a growing population without stripping the earth of its natural resources and biodiversity. Investors include Spark Capital, Charles River Ventures, Root Ventures, Alexis Ohanian and Kyle Vogt, among others.

Come join us in transforming our food system for good!

What you will own at Wildtype

• Own Wildtype’s quality assurance & food safety programs

• Serve as Wildtype’s PCQI (Preventive Controls Qualified Individual) 

• Build and strengthen our food safety and quality inspection procedures

• Ensure that our novel cell-cultivated seafood products meet compliance standards

• Develop standard operating procedures (SOPs) for quality controls and approvals

• Collaborate with our operations team to audit suppliers, ingredients, raw materials, and supplies used within our production process

• Utilize preventive controls and measures to ensure high standards for food safety, plant hygiene, and proper storage 

• Continuously inspect and evaluate the quality parameters of our production process

• Conduct hazard analysis with chemical hazards, physical hazards, allergens, and microbiological hazards to prevent contamination and develop strong protocols

• Create and revise SOPs, and establish KPIs to measure the effectiveness of quality control & food safety

• Use data to identify trends and troubleshoot problems

What we’ll teach you

• How to apply your experience in food safety to an entirely novel production system

• How to work with and lead in a fast-moving, interdisciplinary team working at the leading edge of several fields

What you bring to Wildtype

• Bachelor’s degree in a related field (ie. Biology, Chemistry, or Food Science)

• 2 years of people management experience preferred

• 5+ years of PCQI experience in a manufacturing environment, biotechnology, or life science industry

• Experience leading food safety and being accountable for all audits focused on food safety and quality assurance 

• PCQI and/or HACCP/FSMA certification, GFSI & FSMS experience a plus

• A thorough understanding of GMP (Good Manufacturing Practices), and a commitment to strong safety procedures

• Experience working with regulatory requirements and compliance, such as the FDA, USDA, and other governing bodies

Impact plan

• Within 1 month you will assume full responsibilities of our food safety & quality processes. You will have adapted your experience to Wildtype’s unique manufacturing context. You will have defined your professional development goals for the next 12 months. 

• Within 3 months you will have made significant upgrades to our preventative maintenance and quality protocols. You’ll work cross-functionally with Operations and our R&D team to understand the requirements of our technology and process, and to develop SOPs and safety procedures. 

• Within 6 months you’ll be ready to operate independently, driving projects forward with minimal supervision. From this point on, you’ll work closely with our Operations & Manufacturing teams to ensure a high standard for food safety and quality. You can expect to periodically report progress on your projects to our entire team and will be assuming an increasing level of responsibility.

• Within 12 months you’ll be leading the food safety & quality procedures for the world’s first pilot plant for cell-cultivated seafood and will be laying the groundwork for the next level of scaled production. You’ll lead our interactions with regulatory authorities not just in the United States, but overseas. Your work in bringing one of the first cultivated seafood products in the world to market will position you as a global thought leader on food safety for this new form of meat and seafood production.

Wildtype is committed to building a diverse workplace spanning multiple dimensions including race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, marital status, disability, gender identity, and veteran status.