Director Supply Chain & Hardware Operations

Contract Manufacturing & Industrialization

• Move gripper, cell, cabinet and final assembly to external contract manufacturers and EMS partners, with suppliers building to spec and shipping direct to customers where possible
• Take frozen designs from Product Engineering into repeatable volume production, including ramp plans, build and work instructions and jigs
• Run a first pilot build of grippers outside our own facility within your first 90 days

Supplier Management & Quality

• Select, negotiate with and manage suppliers, including commercial terms and capacity planning
• Build redundancy for critical single points of failure such as the robot arm and long-lead or sole-source parts
• Own incoming inspection, supplier quality, first article inspection, PPM targets and the manufacturing side of the RMA process

Planning, Inventory & Logistics

• Build S&OP, forecasting and buffer stock so parts are staged weeks ahead of each deployment
• Reduce supplier lead times and keep demo and fleet hardware available
• Own shipping and import and export across the EU and US

Cost & Operating Model

• Own hardware unit cost and bring COGS down over time
• Implement the split between bespoke builds and a standardized product line on the operations side
• Set up the supply chain operating model, KPIs and review cadence for your function

Qualifications:

Education and Experience

• 10+ years in supply chain, manufacturing or hardware operations, including several years in a leadership role
• A track record of taking a complex electromechanical product from prototype to hundreds of units per year, with production that kept running after the ramp
• Experience standing up outsourced contract manufacturing, supplier quality, logistics and inventory from scratch in a scaleup or growth-stage company
• Degree in engineering, supply chain, operations or a related field, or equivalent practical experience

Skills

• Hands-on supplier management, including selection, negotiation and supplier quality
• Manufacturing quality, NPI and industrialization experience
• Supply and demand planning and inventory management
• Comfortable installing operating discipline, accountability and KPIs in a fast-moving, resource-constrained environment
• Fluent English and willingness to travel to suppliers and customer sites

Additional Skills / Nice to Have

• Experience in robotics, warehouse automation, AMRs or autonomous vehicles
• Experience turning demos and pilots into repeatable production deployments
• Experience working with product engineering on design-to-cost and DfM
• German fluency

What We Offer:

• Competitive salary and equity in a fast-growing Series B robotics company
• Flexible PTO and a collaborative, high-ownership culture
• Ownership of our supply chain and manufacturing setup as we scale to hundreds of units a year

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Source: Statistisches Bundesamt (Destatis), table; dl-de/by-2-0; StarIn's calculation