Senior Associate, Health & Life Sciences

WHO WE ARE:

Plug and Play is a global innovation platform and one of the most active venture investors in the world. We have 50+ locations and 500+ corporate partners, including Johnson & Johnson, Roche, Pfizer and Walmart. Early bets include PayPal, Dropbox, Guardant Health and Honey.

Our model is simple. We take the best startups in the world and give them three things most founders never get: direct access to corporations, open access to global markets, and open access to global venture capital.

In Amsterdam, we're now launching our most ambitious health, life science and medtech initiative yet. This is Day 1.

WHO WE’RE LOOKING FOR:

We're building a small, select team in Amsterdam, and we want one more person on it. Amsterdam is a small but ambitious office, and you'll be building it from the ground up with us, just like our startups do. You get the network and firepower of a large organisation, with none of the comfort.

Your first job is to be a strong operator in ecosystem building and a trusted advisor to our corporate partners, who are Global 1000 companies. Investing in startups is priority number two. It is still a priority.

You'll report directly to our Director of Benelux. You'll work with founders, C-level executives, and some of the smartest investors on the planet. You'll travel regularly to Lausanne, Valencia and Silicon Valley.

This is not a job for most people. It's intense and it's fast. For the right person, it's the steepest learning curve in European venture and you’ll create an invaluable C-level network in no time.

HOW YOU WILL MAKE A DIFFERENCE:

• Build the ecosystem. You're the operator who makes Amsterdam's health and life science scene run through us: startups, corporates, hospitals, universities and investors.
• Advise Global 1000 corporates. You understand what biotech, medtech or even insurance executives actually need or you know how to quickly source that information. You become the person they call, and you deliver the startups that solve it.
• Make startups grow. You run our health and life science programmes and push every startup towards real traction: pilots, contracts, funding. You’ll help high-potential spin-offs to become actual companies.
• Invest. You source and assess startups for Plug and Play investments and for clients (Global 1000), and you support the deal team from first call to final recommendation.
• Do whatever creates value. One day you're hosting an event and cold-reaching the attendees yourself. The next you're working with the country director on how to 10x the office. Nothing is beneath you, and nothing is above you.
• Make it happen. A client wants you to organise a trade mission to China? Sure. You get scrappy, connect with our teams in Asia and get it done.
• Be in the room with C-levels. You present, run workshops and hold your own with executives who have no time to waste.
• Build the machine. You use AI and modern tools to do in a day what others do in a week, and you make the whole team faster.
  
  

WHO YOU ARE:

• An exceptional communicator. This is non-negotiable. You or your AI write emails people actually answer, you tell a story a CEO remembers, and you can explain a startup in 30 seconds or a strategy in 3 slides. On stage, on a call or in a cold message, you land it.
• A jack of all trades. You'll set up chairs at 8:00, pitch a board at 10:00 and get a trade mission to Silicon Valley organised in the next 4 months, and you're great at all of it.
• Ready to get your hands dirty. You're not too senior for anything. If it creates massively more value for our customers than it takes, you do it.
• Scrappy. You find a way. No budget, no intro, no template? No problem.
• A global connector. Client wants to meet startups in Silicon Valley next month? Sure. You call our teams in the US, line up the right founders and make it happen. Our 50+ offices are your team.
• Relentless. You work hard every week, not just in bursts. We’re a small office - everything you do or don’t do results in impact.
• Focused. You know the 20% that drives 80% of results, and you ignore the rest.
• Trustworthy. Founders, corporates and investors tell you things in confidence. You never break that.
• AI-native. You use AI daily, you have strong opinions on your tool stack, and you automate the boring parts.
• A self-starter. You see what needs doing and do it before anyone asks.
• Deep in healthcare. You have a strong background and network in health, life sciences or medtech.
• Ideally ex-consulting. You can structure a messy problem and present it to a board or get tactical if need to.
• VC experience is a plus, not a must.
• Fluent in English. Dutch is a strong plus. Dutch and French are gold.
• In the room. You're at our Amsterdam office at least 3 days a week. Ecosystems get built face to face.
  
  

WHAT WE OFFER:

• We’re a flat organisation but opportunities at Plug and Play are huge; lead a country / region / program / vertical or fast-track towards an investment partner. Underpromise, overdeliver and you’ll get rewarded.
• A front-row seat to hundreds of startups, Global 1000 companies’ CXO’s and global investors. You'll learn every part of venture faster than anywhere else.
• Life at the edge of innovation. You see it first-hand. You'll find yourself in some of the hottest innovation hotspots in the world, and you'll actually see the impact being created.
• Occasional travel to Lausanne, Valencia, Stuttgart and Silicon Valley.
• Hybrid, Amsterdam-based. You're in the office 3 days a week, at the heart of the ecosystem you're building.
• A voice that counts. You get to shape this office. It's a startup inside a global platform, everyone's voice is heard and matters here, and your work shows directly in the results.