Connectors engineer (mid / senior / lead)

Role Title: Connectors Engineer (Mid / Senior / Lead)
Department: Product Engineering
Location: Mumbai / Pune (Onsite)
Reports To: Engineering Manager
Experience: 5+ years, hiring across levels. Level is set by what you can own end to end, not by years on a resume.
Employment Type: Full-time

About Scitara: Scitara is a global leader in digital transformation for scientific laboratories, enabling connectivity, automation, and data integrity across instruments, applications, and enterprise systems. Our cloud-based DLX platform is used by the world's top pharma, biotech, life sciences, and industrial R& D labs to modernize workflows and accelerate scientific outcomes. Lab informatics is growing 50 to 70% over the next five years, at the exact moment AI is being layered onto scientific data workflows. None of that works until the data gets off the instrument. That is what connectors do.

Role Summary: Connectors are how DLX reaches into the lab: chromatography systems, balances, plate readers, LIMS, ELNs, and vendor applications that were never designed to talk to anything. They are C#/. NET Windows services running on lab PCs, with no web stack. Each one is its own small project with its own surprises: a vendor SDK, a COM or OLE interface, a serial protocol, a file drop, a database nobody documented. Because there are dozens of these projects and each one is different, this role is for a generalist who is comfortable being handed an unfamiliar system and working out how to make it reliable. A specialty in one integration style is welcome on top of that, but it will be useful on one project in fifty, so it cannot be the whole story.

How Engineering Works Here:
We are a small team with a large product. That shapes everything:
You deliver features, not tickets. You get a target system and a goal. You work out how to talk to it, what the data looks like, how to make it reliable, and how to prove it. Nobody hands you a task list.
AI is part of the job. We use agentic coding tools every day to design, generate, test, and document. You are expected to work this way and to be a sharp reviewer of what the tools produce. You own the result, not the tool.
We are regulated. Connectors run inside validated Gx P labs. Data integrity, traceability, and auditability are design constraints, not a checklist at the end.
Thinkers and doers. The people who do well here notice problems, propose fixes, get them wrong sometimes, and get them right the next time. They bring ideas back to the team instead of waiting to be told.

Key Outcomes (First 6 to 12 Months): Deliver complete connectors into customer labs: discovery, design, implementation, tests, validation evidence, documentation. Take a target system from "here is the vendor" to a working plan without waiting for a task breakdown. Improve the shared connector framework and tooling so the next connector is faster than the last. Use AI tooling to cut the time from vendor documentation (or its absence) to working code. Senior / Lead: own the connector architecture and set the bar for the engineers around you.

Responsibilities: Responsibilities Design and build connectors as C#/. NET Windows services that integrate instruments and lab systems with the DLX platform. Work with whatever the target exposes: REST, vendor SDKs, COM/OLE, file systems, databases, serial and network protocols. Build for environments you do not control: locked-down lab PCs, restricted networks, machines you cannot restart at will. Write code that meets data integrity and validation requirements. Use agentic development tools as the default way of working, and review their output critically. Troubleshoot integration issues in customer environments using structured problem-solving. Participate in design reviews, code reviews, and Agile ceremonies as a contributor, not an attendee. Senior / Lead: lead spikes on new integration approaches; mentor and raise engineering standards.

Must-Have: Strong C# and. NET, including long-running services (Windows Services or equivalent), not just web applications. You have integrated with systems you did not build and could not change, and made those integrations reliable. Comfortable starting from incomplete or missing documentation and working out how a system behaves. Daily, hands-on use of AI coding tools, and the judgement to know when they are wrong. A track record of delivering work you were given as goals, not as task lists. Solid engineering fundamentals: design, testing, debugging. Git and CI/CD in a team setting.

Good-to-Have: COM/OLE, Windows API, instrument protocols (serial, GPIB, TCP/IP), or file-based integrations. Lab informatics or scientific instruments: LIMS, ELN, CDS, chromatography, analytical instruments. Regulated software: Gx P, GAMP 5, 21 CFR Part 11, data integrity. Messaging systems (Kafka, Rabbit MQ) and distributed or event-driven design. Exposure to the platform side: Node.js/Type Script, cloud services, AWS. Building AI agents or working with MCP servers.

Success Indicators: Connectors reach customer labs without needing the plan written for you. Each connector you deliver makes the next one easier. Your use of AI tooling makes you faster and your work more thorough, and your peers pick up what you learn. Colleagues in product, quality, services, and the platform team trust your judgement. Senior / Lead: connector decisions get made well when the architect is not in the room.

Why Join Scitara? Get real instruments talking to real science for the labs developing the next generation of therapies. Variety: every connector is a new system and a new problem. Work in an engineering culture where AI-native development is the default, not an experiment. Real ownership: designs and decisions are yours. Clear paths into technical leadership and architecture.