Lead Agronomist (m/f/d)

Greenda is an early-stage Ag Tech startup backed by TDK, building the scientific backbone that makes precision agriculture actionable for farmers and agri-technicians.

Our platform combines image-based crop diagnosis, pest prediction, and integrated pest management tools to deliver grounded, field-relevant intelligence at scale.

We are currently focused on permanent horticultural crops in Spain, with a roadmap to expand into new markets as our science and data infrastructure matures.

Why this role matters

This is a scientific leadership position at Greenda.

You will be the bridge between field agronomy and our data science & product teams, ensuring that everything we build is scientifically grounded, operationally relevant, and genuinely useful to the farmers and technicians who depend on it.

You will not only bring deep agronomic expertise to the team.

You will help shape the data infrastructure that powers our machine learning models, lead the agronomy function as it grows, and contribute to the strategic direction of our scientific roadmap.

This role sits at the intersection of agronomy, data science, product, and strategy, and requires someone who is as comfortable discussing pest phenology & entomology as they are designing and building a data pipeline with an ML/AI engineer.

This is a role for someone who is motivated to build accessible, useful, and affordable technology for small and medium sized farmers.

What you'll do

• Scientific leadership
• Own the scientific integrity of Greenda's three core product tracks: image-based crop diagnosis, pest prediction, and IPM protocol building
• Serve as the primary domain expert for the data science and product teams, ensuring agronomic accuracy at every stage of model development and product design
• Define what good looks like for training data, model outputs, and diagnostic recommendations across our crop portfolio in Spain
• Data and pipeline strategy
• Lead the design of Greenda's pre-ML data processing pipeline, from raw field submission to model-ready input
• Define data quality standards, annotation logic, and validation workflows in collaboration with the data scientist and software team
• Contribute to the strategy for building a high-quality, sustainable labeled dataset through field campaigns, expert networks, and product design
• Identify and communicate data infrastructure needs clearly to technical and non-technical colleagues
• Manage the Greenda Crop Assessment platform
• Monitor and report on data collection metrics by pulling and interpreting platform metadata, tracking the volume, quality, and completeness of agronomist submissions over time
• Translate agronomic needs into clear, actionable product feedback that the development team can scope and implement
• Collaborate with the data science team to design and build compliance features into the platform, ensuring that regulatory requirements are addressed at the infrastructure level rather than retrospectively
• Maintain a feedback loop between platform performance and scientific output, flagging when data collection patterns are affecting model quality or agronomic reliability
• Team building and leadership
• Lead the on-the-ground agronomy team; supervising the work and progress of an established team of Spanish Greenda agronomists
• Work closely with leadership, contributing to technical hiring decisions with a domain lens
• Contribute to research and insight reports that communicate field intelligence to external stakeholders
• Cross-functional contribution
• Act as the agronomic voice in product development, ensuring that features are designed around how farmers and field agents actually work
• Support B2B strategy by translating complex model outputs and scientific logic into clear, actionable language for clients and partners
• What we are looking for
• 6+ years of hands-on agronomy experience, with meaningful exposure to data science, ML pipelines, or working alongside technical teams
• Deep knowledge of pest phenology, entomology, and crop health diagnosis, ideally across permanent horticultural crops in Spain or the broader Mediterranean region
• Experience translating field agronomic knowledge into structured data, annotation logic, or model-relevant inputs
• A track record of leading or growing a team, whether agronomy, technical, or both
• Comfort operating at the intersection of science, product, and strategy
• Strong communication skills, with the ability to make complex agronomic science clear and actionable for engineers, product managers, and clients alike
• Full professional proficiency in English; Spanish is a strong plus given our current market focus
• A genuine drive to build technology that makes a real difference for farmers
• A track record of proactively sharing progress, surfacing risks early, inviting constructive challenges, and helping create an environment where good ideas can come from anyone on the team.
• A strong commitment to psychological safety, respectful collaboration, and supporting teammates through open communication, curiosity, and patience.
• This role requires existing work authorization for Germany or the EU
• As Greenda's first dedicated Lead Agronomist hire, you'll define how agronomy is built here, not inherit someone else's stack or roadmap.
• You'll work directly with the CSO on strategy from day one, with a clear path to lead and grow the agronomy function as we scale, including hiring and shaping the team under you.
• Annual training and self-development budget to support continuous learning and career growth.
• Join an international, mission-driven team working on applied Ag Tech innovation.
• Empower small and medium farmers with next-generation Integrated Pest Management (IPM) protocols and accessible, applied-agriculture AI.
• One-week, fully funded "farm stay" experience: live and work on an organic farm to connect with real-world agriculture (self-organized, WWOOF-style).
• Company benefits including lunch, transport, and internet allowances.
• 30 days of paid vacation.

Application notice

Our team will be operating with reduced capacity over the coming weeks due to scheduled vacations.

As a result, it may take us a little longer than usual to review applications and respond.

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