VP, Product Engineering, Genetics Portfolio

Reports to: SVP, Laboratory Systems and Product Engineering

Work Model: Remote (with periodic travel to San Carlos, CA and Austin, TX)

Position Summary

The Vice President of Product Engineering, Genetics Portfolio is a senior executive leadership role responsible for the software product strategy, roadmap, and delivery for Natera’s Women’s Health, Organ Health, and Emerging Business/Rare Disease Diagnostics business units. This leader acts as the primary technical liaison to the business unit General Managers and is the single person accountable for the vertical’s success in these high-growth areas.

You will oversee a dedicated team of Digital Product Managers (DPMs), Product Solution Architects, and Product Integration Engineers. Your organization is responsible for defining "what" needs to be built to support a diverse portfolio, including Horizon (Carrier Screening), Empower (Hereditary Cancer Screening), Renasight (Chronic Kidney Disease), Panorama (NIPT), and specialized panels for Rare Disease diagnostics. You will partner with the VP of Software Engineering to leverage a shared pool of ~350 engineers for the technical implementation of the roadmap.

In the first 90 days, the VP will establish deep partnerships with the GMs of Women’s Health, Organ Health, and Emerging Businesses to align on strategic goals. You will audit the existing Genetics and Rare Disease digital product roadmaps, identify critical gaps in the user experience, and establish a clear "service-level" relationship with the horizontal engineering teams.

Within the first year, you are expected to have successfully supported the commercialization of new products, driven measurable improvements to existing on-market products, and launched innovative software support for the Emerging Business/Rare Disease pipeline. Success will be reflected in product launch predictability, revenue enablement through new features, and a seamless digital experience that positions Natera as the market leader in reproductive, renal, and rare disease health.

Key Responsibilities

Vertical Product Strategy & Roadmap Ownership

• Define and own the multi-year software roadmap for the Genetics portfolio, including Women's Health, Organ Health, and Emerging Business / Rare Disease Diagnostics, ensuring alignment with clinical utility and revenue targets.
• Act as the Executive Sponsor for major pillar projects, ensuring they meet commercial expectations and quality standards through the entire product lifecycle.
• Lead the Digital Product Management team to translate complex clinical needs into technical requirements, prioritizing the backlog for maximum patient and business impact.
• Drive the strategy for Product Integration, ensuring a frictionless ordering and reporting experience across provider portals and EMR systems, Accessioning/LIMS, Lab Workflow Tracking, Bioinformatics Pipelines, and Tertiary Analysis and reporting systems.

Operational Excellence & Partnership

• Operate as a "servant-leader" customer of the centralized Engineering organization, providing clear requirements and priorities to enable efficient technical execution.
• Partner with the centralized PMO and the Software Engineering VP to ensure project milestones are hit and risks are mitigated before they impact launch dates.
• Collaborate with R&D and Laboratory Operations to ensure new assays—including those for emerging and rare disease markets—are launched with "automation-first" software that reduces manual burden.
• Track and report on portfolio-specific KPIs, including product performance, user adoption, and delivery velocity.

Leadership & Team Development

• Lead and mentor a specialized team of Product Solution Architects and Integration Engineers, fostering a culture of technical rigor and business empathy.
• Bridge the gap between scientific complexity (Genetics, Bioinformatics) and digital product simplicity, ensuring tools are intuitive for clinicians and internal lab staff.
• Manage the organizational transition from technology-focused component teams to mission-oriented cross-functional pods.

Regulatory & Clinical Quality

• Ensure all software products meet the stringent requirements of a CLIA/CAP-certified and FDA-regulated environment.
• Partner with Quality and Regulatory teams to ensure requirements and design controls are properly documented to support successful audits and submissions.

Qualifications

Required

• 15+ years of progressive experience in software product engineering or technology leadership, with a significant background in Clinical Genomics, Diagnostics, or Rare Disease.
• Demonstrated success leading complex, multi-product portfolios and managing senior leaders (Directors/Sr. Directors).
• Deep understanding of the software infrastructure (LIMS, Portals, EMR) required to support high-volume genetic testing at scale.
• Proven track record of managing high-stakes partnerships between business units and a centralized engineering execution arm.

Preferred

• Experience in product life cycle management, including supporting the commercialization of new diagnostics and driving continuous improvement for on-market products.
• Background in high-throughput Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) laboratory workflows.
• Advanced degree (Masters or Ph.D.) in Molecular Biology, Bioinformatics, or Computer Science.