Founding Engineer / Head of Technology (m/f/d)

Who we are

We are the National Heart Network, or NHN for short – a newly founded non-profit limited liability company (gGmbH) based in Düsseldorf and a 100% subsidiary of the German Society of Cardiology (DGK).

Cardiovascular diseases are the leading cause of death in Germany and incur immense costs in the healthcare system, amounting to 64 billion Euros annually. It quickly becomes clear: intensive research into treatment options saves lives and money. It is all the more astonishing that the documentation of a treatment ends at the clinic door. The treating hospital has no information about how the patient is doing after treatment, and therefore does not know if the treatment was successful or unnecessary. Only the local general practitioner or cardiologist sees this. There is no data exchange.

Our goal is to close this gap: We are building the first nationwide digital register for cardiovascular treatments: That means: all information in one place. This is now possible because, with the help of state-of-the-art AI technology combined with top medical expertise, we are able to unify diverse data sources. Through the NHN, doctors can see how therapies work under real conditions – and direct treatments to where they actually bring the greatest benefit, so that people with cardiovascular diseases receive measurably better care and can live longer with a higher quality of life.

We are at the very beginning. You will join at a time when everything is still being shaped – the processes, the culture, the way we work. What is being created today will shape German heart medicine for many years to come – and you can be a part of it.

Responsibilities

You will build the technical platform of the NHN, recruit and lead the tech team.

• You will develop our data platform, consisting of backend and frontend.
• You will build the AI-supported extraction, meaning the pipelines that convert unstructured clinical documents into structured medical data. This includes OCR, NLP, and modern language models, as well as review and approval by medical personnel. The success of the entire project hinges on the quality of this pipeline.
• You will ensure interoperability by consistently relying on standards such as FHIR, HL7, and IHE. This way, our data remains connectable nationally and internationally.
• You will consider data protection and security from the outset: Privacy by Design, pseudonymization via an independent trust office, and preparation for ISO 27001. Our Head of Legal holds the regulatory responsibility and will work closely with you.
• You will make pragmatic technology decisions with a view to robustness, auditability, and speed. You will know which decisions are expensive to change later and which can be altered without risk.
• You will build the team, first the initial developers and ML engineers, then the structure behind them. You will integrate external partners where they make us faster, without relinquishing core components.

Qualifications

• You have designed and scaled complex data platforms, ideally in healthcare or another highly regulated environment such as FinTech or Cybersecurity.
• You are extremely hands-on: cloud-native software development and modern web technologies are as much your forte as ML development and MLOps, right up to fine-tuning large transformer models.
• You have built something from scratch before, without an existing platform and without a large team behind you.
• You combine technical vision with pragmatic implementation and prioritize a roadmap so that a functional product exists early on.
• Knowledge of interoperability standards and medical terminologies is a plus, but not a requirement. Medical expertise comes from our medical team.
• You have experience in building agile teams and maintaining the balance between in-house development and external partners.
• You have very good German language skills, as our partners are German hospitals.
• You want to make a societal contribution through technology.

Benefits

• Work with genuine societal added value: The technology you build is intended to be in productive use in over 60 clinics within two years. We aim to contribute to a better healthcare system, not to generate returns for shareholders.
• Secure environment, assured financing: As a subsidiary of the German Society of Cardiology (DGK), we stand on a reliable foundation. Our financing is secured long-term. You will experience the build-up dynamics of a young organization without the usual start-up risks.
• Scope for development and perspective: You will be responsible for the technical architecture from the outset and will build up the department. The role is designed to grow with the NHN and with you.
• Fair pay: Appropriate, market-competitive compensation that matches your qualifications and experience.
• A modern, easily accessible office in Düsseldorf with the possibility of mobile working, with short distances, flat hierarchies, and a appreciative collaboration in a small team.
• Full-time position, start date by arrangement, as early as possible.

We look forward to receiving your application with your CV and a few lines about your motivation.

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