SR Principal/Principal Engineer, Automation (Saint Joseph, United States, Missouri)
About this opportunity
Description
As an employee of Boehringer Ingelheim, you will actively contribute to the discovery, development, and delivery of our products to our patients and customers. Our global presence provides opportunity for all employees to collaborate internationally, offering visibility and opportunity to directly contribute to the companies' success. We realize that our strength and competitive advantage lie with our people. We support our employees in several ways to foster a healthy working environment, meaningful work, mobility, networking, and work-life balance. Our competitive compensation and benefit programs reflect Boehringer Ingelheim's high regard for our employees.
The Senior Principal Engineer, Automation will serve as an Automation Process-specific Subject Matter Expert (SME) for one or more aspects of the aseptic manufacturing process System Integration, including but not limited to Active Ingredient Production, Filling, Freeze Drying, and Packaging.
The incumbent’s expertise is applied by providing direct manufacturing support and troubleshooting of with the targeted Automation system architecture as well as serving as technical and/or overall lead for capital projects involving the installation of new or modification of existing automation system, equipment and/or utilities.
Duties & Responsibilities
SR Principal Engineer
Demonstrates and directly applies SME-level mastery of automation system/control process-specific engineering principles in solving vaccine manufacturing challenges varying in both scope and complexity.
Capability to lead cross functional teams in day-to-day operations or as members of a project team. Team composition is junior engineers, technicians, etc.
Accountable for goal development and assessment of reports.
Develops the Automation strategy to support business needs of area of responsibility.
Leads automation system development, modification, and optimization efforts on a large scale and drives actions that require the buy-in and support from multiple other functions including but not limited to Operations, Quality, Project Engineering, and Maintenance (PME).
Cross-functional leadership capability is essential.
Supports manufacturing in troubleshooting automation and control system with equipment issues on a large-scale.
Drives the communication of the auto integrated system between stakeholder to identify issues with the manufacturing process and find long term solutions to these issues.
Identifies improvements to manufacturing process. Improvements may include mechanical, automation, or workflow.
Works with manufacturing and capital engineering on the development of future capital projects and on the development of requirements for the project.
Responsible for User Requirement Specification development.
Leads small scale capital projects up to around $1M annual spend, primarily those with heavy technical components.
Accountable for following capital process procedures and execution of project regarding cost and schedule.
On larger capital projects, works with Capital Engineering and Equipment Vendors to ensure process requirements are communicated and built into the equipment/system design.
Develops specifications (user, functional, and detailed design) for equipment and automation of the equipment.
Develops and maintains overall knowledge of Automation system platform, IT infrastructure, automation manufacture integrated system/control.
Provides training on automation integrated system and/or equipment modifications as required for new or existing equipment/processes.
Acts as Subject Matter Expert for production equipment and processes for Capital Engineering, Production, Business Process Science, Quality Assurance, and Maintenance.
Educates and mentors other engineers, technicians, etc. to foster a continuous effort to bring others to the same level of expertise.
Principal Engineer
Manages capital and expense projects ensuring sustainable growth of site automation technologies.
Maintains building automation system including lifecycle management, modification and troubleshooting in compliance with BIAH SOPs and current industry standards.
Researches and evaluates potential automation projects to determine feasibility.
Provides data and proposals to management to guide site investment strategy.
Develops and implements site automation improvement initiatives.
Acts as automation and controls subject matter expert on large capital projects.
Supports day to day site automation and controls needs, minimizing production loss.
Produces and implements CAPA plans to prevent future occurrences.
Leads root cause analysis initiatives as related to automation topics.
Conducts research on new technologies, gains competency and trains others after implementation.
Requirements
SR Principal Engineer
Bachelor’s Degree in Engineering.
OR
Minimum seven (7) years of System Control field experience.
Integrator level capability in the following:
Low voltage controls (relays, safety circuits, drives, etc.)
Devices and interface technologies (sensors, IO modules, fieldbus, and networking).
PLC programming including ladder, function block and structured text.
RS Logix experience is preferred.
HMI/SCADA systems.
Automation Network infrastructure knowledge of IT4OT design requirements.
MES and MES MI design requirement.
Proficiency in the following:
Building automation systems is experience is preferred.
Ability to clearly communicate verbally and in writing in a cross functional team.
Good project management and organizational skills.
Principal Engineer
Bachelor’s Degree in Engineering or Control Systems field with four (4) years professional experience.
Integrator level capability in the following:
Low voltage controls (relays, safety circuits, drives, etc.)
Devices and interface technologies (sensors, IO modules, fieldbus and networking).
PLC programming including ladder, function block and structured text.
RSLogix experience is preferred.
HMI/SCADA systems.
FactoryTalk View experience is preferred.
Proficiency in the following:
Mechanical design methods and techniques using 3D CAD software.
SolidWorks experience is preferred.
Building automation systems.
Siemens Insight or Desigo experience is preferred.
Ability to clearly communicate verbally and in writing in a cross functional team.
Good project management and organizational skills.
Eligibility Requirements :
Must be legally authorized to work in the United States without restriction.
Must be willing to take a drug test and post-offer physical (if required).
Must be 18 years of age or older.
#LI-KD1
Desired Skills, Experience and Abilities
]]>
Job details
How this role compares
Computed from every other active Manufacturing & CMC role in our database, not just this employer's listings.
We currently track 393 comparable Principal Manufacturing & CMC roles across 56 biopharma companies.
Salary context
189 of 393 peers report a salary range (USD, annualized)
Peers share this role's job function and a matching or adjacent seniority level -- not necessarily the same therapeutic area or country.
Where these roles are based
Top locations among the 393 comparable roles
+ 13 more countries
Seniority mix
393 of 393 peers have a known seniority level
Therapeutic area mix
2 of 393 peers have a known therapeutic area; the rest are genuinely unlabeled, not hidden
Similar opportunities
The closest matches from our peer group, ranked by how similar they are, not how well you'd qualify for them -- treat this as market context, not a guaranteed shortlist; a weak match is labeled as one below.
How we calculate "similar"
No black box, no LLM guesswork: a deterministic score built from four normalized attributes. Here's this role's own peer group at different match levels, so you can see the mechanism, not just the result.
Every comparison starts from the same 100-point budget: 25 for working in the same function, 40 for the same therapeutic area, 20 for the same or adjacent seniority, 15 for the same country. A dimension we can't confirm on both sides contributes nothing, never a guess, never a free pass.
0 points, never a partial guess. A role we know almost nothing about beyond its function bottoms out at 25%; it never inflates to 100% just because there's little to compare against. Seniority uses a defined ladder (Associate → Manager → Associate Director → Senior → Principal → Director → Senior Director → Executive/VP) so "Director" and "Senior Director" count as adjacent, but "Director" and "Executive/VP" do not.