Scientist at Oculis

Key Responsibilities

Formulation Development

• Design and execute formulation development studies for pharmaceutical drug products, including solution, suspension, and other dosage forms as required.
• Prepare and evaluate pre-formulation and formulation robustness studies using appropriate pharmaceutical excipients and technologies.
• Characterize formulations with respect to physicochemical properties, stability, and performance.
• Identify critical formulation parameters and optimize composition to support product stability, efficacy, and manufacturability.
• Document experimental results and interpret data to guide formulation optimization.

Process Development & Optimization

• Develop and optimize laboratory-scale manufacturing processes for drug product formulations.
• Establish and refine process parameters to ensure reproducibility and scalability.
• Support scale-up activities and technology transfer to manufacturing or external development partners.
• Investigate and resolve formulation or process-related issues encountered during development.

Analytical Development

• Develop, optimize and perform analytical methods to support formulation and process development activities
• Conduct physicochemical characterization of drug substance and drug products including assays, impurity profiling, and stability assessments.
• Utilize analytical techniques such as HPLC/UPLC, UV-Vis spectroscopy, particle size analysis, pH, osmolality, and other relevant analytical tools
• Generate and interpret analytical data to support formulation screening, stability studies, and process optimization.
• Ensure analytical procedures are performed according to established protocols and laboratory standards.

Documentation & Compliance

• Maintain accurate documentation of experiments, results, and development activities in accordance with internal quality standards.
• Contribute to the preparation and maintenance of laboratory procedures and standard operating procedures (SOPs).
• Support regulatory documentation and development reports where required.
• Ensure laboratory activities comply with applicable safety guidelines and quality requirements.

Collaboration & Communication

• Work closely with analytical scientists, project teams, and external partners to support integrated drug development activities.
• Present experimental results and scientific insights during internal meetings.
• Identify opportunities to improve laboratory workflows, experimental methodologies, and development processes.

Experience

• Minimum 3 years of relevant experience in pharmaceutical formulation, process development or analytical development within an industry.
• Familiarity with Design of Experiments (DoE) and data analysis tools.

Skills

• Strong knowledge of pharmaceutical formulation principles and excipient functionality.
• Experience with analytical techniques such as HPLC/UPLC, UV-Vis spectroscopy, pH measurement, osmolality, particle size analysis, or related analytical methods.
• Ability to design and execute laboratory experiments, including formulation screening and process optimization.
• Experience analyzing experimental data and drawing scientifically sound conclusions.
• Understanding of pharmaceutical development guidelines and quality principles.
• Experience writing standard operating procedures (SOPs), technical reports, or development documentation is highly desirable.
• Strong scientific communication skills, both written and verbal.
• Strong attention to detail and ability to maintain accurate documentation.
• Excellent organizational and time-management skills in a laboratory environment.
• Fluent in English (written and spoken); additional languages are a plus

Education

• MSc or PhD in Pharmaceutical Sciences, Chemistry, Chemical Engineering, Biomedical Sciences, or related scientific discipline.