Lilly Posted July 21, 2026

Principal Automation Integration Engineer – API Network

Indianapolis, Indiana, United States of America FULL_TIME
Manufacturing & CMC Principal

Lilly is the source of truth for this posting and owns the application process. We surface normalized context and market comparison you won't find on the original listing.

About this opportunity

At Lilly, we unite caring with discovery to make life better for people around the world. We are a global healthcare leader headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana. Our employees around the world work to discover and bring life-changing medicines to those who need them, improve the understanding and management of disease, and give back to our communities through philanthropy and volunteerism. We give our best effort to our work, and we put people first. We’re looking for people who are determined to make life better for people around the world.

Organization Overview:

Lilly is at a critical juncture as we tool up to realize the potential of our product pipeline. We are building new processing capabilities around the world, and emphasizing emerging, innovative technologies, such as continuous processing, biotech platforms, and advanced data and control systems. Additionally, we are recapitalizing older assets and bringing the operational philosophies in line with current technologies. Lilly places a high value on fully automated manufacturing processes, as the quality and operational benefits are baseline expectations of new process design.

Digital Manufacturing Engineering (DME) is part of the Corporate Engineering Tech Center (ETC). The ETC is a technical resource for training, standards, project implementation, and the center of engineering excellence for the corporation, providing deeply technical resources to solve the most intractable technical problems in manufacturing. DME provides Digital Engineering Platform ownership, OT data integration solutions, engineering data standardization/ownership, and digital manufacturing solutions for Lilly Manufacturing. Our team focuses on connecting our facilities (securely) and leveraging the data from those facilities to deliver digital manufacturing solutions to improve manufacturing productivity, data integrity / compliance, quality, and operational excellence. Digital Manufacturing Technologies include digital twins, computational modeling, edge/IoT, and analytics solutions. Digital Engineering Platforms include CMMS (Computerized Maintenance Management System), GECMS (Global Engineering Content Management System) and many other digital platforms leveraged by engineers across Lilly Manufacturing.

Position Description and Responsibilities:

The Principal Automation Integration Engineer – API Network Integration will enable information and data flow between Manufacturing Science, Quality, Engineering, Supply Chain, and Operations by leveraging IT and Process Automation Technologies. This role will support innovation evaluation and application for Manufacturing Process Automation and IT Systems with a focus on data historians, advanced analytics, cyber security, and process optimization. The primary focus of the role will be to work with our Process Automation and IT systems to integrate data supporting major capital projects. The role will be focused on supporting sites and projects within the API Network. These systems include (but not limited too) process automation platforms, HMI/SCADA, Data Historians, Alarm/Event management, and Manufacturing Execution systems. A high level of experience in automation architecture and technology trends is desired, with additional expertise needed in the primary areas of process automation and control: safety systems, process control, motion control, cyber security, and batch control. This role can be paralleled to being an “in-house system integrator” within the corporate engineering team. This role is a mid-level engineering role which requires high learning agility and an interest and/or background in project management along with a technical understanding of automation system integration. There is an expectation of travel to other Lilly domestic and international locations, generally 20%, with periods of heavy travel during commissioning of projects with up to 80% travel or short-term assignments to relocate to the project location.

Key Objectives/Deliverables:

Work safely and continually look for improvements to both people and equipment safety.

Provide project management and technical leadership of central automation system platform delivery for major capital projects at new and existing Lilly Manufacturing sites.

Develop and maintain a fully integrated schedule, connecting key milestones from the various workstreams/systems within the automation integration scope.

System Integrator – Develop robust and innovative solutions enabling our manufacturing engineers to utilize data to drive improvement decisions, identify issues, and utilize advanced analytics.

Ensure overall automation integration system requirements are delivered and tested, and that timing/dependencies for this work is included in overall project schedule.

Escalate key issues or barriers through project leadership team to resolve.

Facilitate regularly scheduled system delivery meetings (coordination meetings with other workstreams, working sessions, and project status updates to leadership)

Basic Qualifications:

Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Computer Science, Information Systems, or related technical discipline.

3+ years of hands-on experience in process automation engineering and data integration (e.g. data historians, data analytics, visualization, MES integration, enterprise level applications, and security)

Prior project management and technical leadership experience on large projects (preferably $2-3M+)

Qualified applicants must be authorized to work in the United States on a full-time basis. Lilly will not provide support for or sponsor work authorization or visas for this role, including but not limited to F-1 CPT, F-1 OPT, F-1 STEM OPT, J-1, H-1B, TN, O-1, E-3, H-1B1, or L-1.

Additional Skills/Preferences:

Knowledge of System Integration, Data Integration, Databases, enterprise systems, Process Automation Systems, Historian, and Manufacturing Execution Systems

Core knowledge related to ISE S95 and S88 principles

IT/Automation integration

Demonstrated proficiency in project management

Ability to work well with different cultures

Experience in pharma or GMP industry

Experience working with validated systems

Expertise in Lilly’s preferred platforms, including Rockwell Automation, Emerson DeltaV, PMX/PharmaSuite, and Syncade

Experience in OSI PI Data Historians

Additional Information:

Monday through Friday Day Shift of 7:30am-4:30pm with some allowance for flex time.

Location: Indianapolis, IN

Travel: Domestic and International travel required (generally 20%, heavy periods up to 80%)

Lilly is dedicated to helping individuals with disabilities to actively engage in the workforce, ensuring equal opportunities when vying for positions. If you require accommodation to submit a resume for a position at Lilly, please complete the accommodation request form ( https://careers.lilly.com/us/en/workplace-accommodation ) for further assistance. Please note this is for individuals to request an accommodation as part of the application process and any other correspondence will not receive a response.

Lilly is proud to be an EEO Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of age, race, color, religion, gender identity, sex, gender expression, sexual orientation, genetic information, ancestry, national origin, protected veteran status, disability, or any other legally protected status.

Our employee resource groups (ERGs) offer strong support networks for their members and are open to all employees. Our current groups include: Africa, Middle East, Central Asia Network, Black Employees at Lilly, Chinese Culture Network, Japanese International Leadership Network (JILN), Lilly India Network, Organization of Latinx at Lilly (OLA), PRIDE (LGBTQ+ Allies), Veterans Leadership Network (VLN), Women’s Initiative for Leading at Lilly (WILL), enAble (for people with disabilities). Learn more about all of our groups.

Actual compensation will depend on a candidate’s education, experience, skills, and geographic location.  The anticipated wage for this position is

$66,000 - $171,600

Full-time equivalent employees also will be eligible for a company bonus (depending, in part, on company and individual performance). In addition, Lilly offers a comprehensive benefit program to eligible employees, including eligibility to participate in a company-sponsored 401(k); pension; vacation benefits; eligibility for medical, dental, vision and prescription drug benefits; flexible benefits (e.g., healthcare and/or dependent day care flexible spending accounts); life insurance and death benefits; certain time off and leave of absence benefits; and well-being benefits (e.g., employee assistance program, fitness benefits, and employee clubs and activities).Lilly reserves the right to amend, modify, or terminate its compensation and benefit programs in its sole discretion and Lilly’s compensation practices and guidelines will apply regarding the details of any promotion or transfer of Lilly employees.

#WeAreLilly

Job details

Seniority
Principal
Function
Manufacturing & CMC
Therapeutic area
Not listed
Location
Indianapolis, Indiana, United States of America
Employment type
FULL_TIME

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.

393Comparable roles tracked
368Currently active
56Companies hiring similar roles
19Countries represented

Salary context

188 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.

This roleSubject $66,000/yr – $171,600/yr
Lowest disclosed · Senior Scientist II – CMC Developmental Sciences · AbbVie $0/hr – $0/hr (≈ $0–$0/yr)
Highest disclosed · Director, Global Automation Engineering · AbbVie $182,000/yr – $346,000/yr
Peer group range $0 – $264,000 (median $150,600)

Where these roles are based

Top locations among the 393 comparable roles

United States282
India42
Singapore10
Ireland9
Netherlands7
Switzerland6

+ 13 more countries

Seniority mix

393 of 393 peers have a known seniority level

Senior251
Principal78
Director64

Therapeutic area mix

2 of 393 peers have a known therapeutic area; the rest are genuinely unlabeled, not hidden

Oncology1
Vaccines & Infectious Disease1

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.

60%similar
Lilly Indianapolis, Indiana, United States of America Principal
Same function Same seniority Same country
60%similar
Lilly Louisville, Colorado, United States of America Principal
Same function Same seniority Same country
60%similar
Lilly Indianapolis, Indiana, United States of America Principal
Same function Same seniority Same country
60%similar
Lilly Watertown, Massachusetts, United States of America Principal
Same function Same seniority Same country
60%similar
Lilly Indianapolis, Indiana, United States of America Principal
Same function Same seniority Same country
60%similar
Lilly Indianapolis, Indiana, United States of America Principal
Same function Same seniority Same country

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.

60%
Senior/Principal Scientist, Bioprocess Purification Development
Lilly · Indianapolis, Indiana, United States of America · Principal
Function Therapeutic area Seniority Country
60%
Senior Principal Scientist, Analytical Sciences
Lilly · Watertown, Massachusetts, United States of America · Principal
Function Therapeutic area Seniority Country
60%
Sr. Principal or Engineering Advisor - Agentic Lab Automation Integration
Lilly · Indianapolis, Indiana, United States of America · Principal
Function Therapeutic area Seniority Country
60%
Principal Scientist, Downstream Process Development
Merck · Rahway, New Jersey, United States of America · Principal
Function Therapeutic area Seniority Country
Unmatched or unknown dimensions score exactly the same: 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.