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Prior Labs is a frontier AI company pioneering tabular foundation models—applying the transformative power of large language models to structured data, the world's largest and most consequential data format. TabPFN v2, published as a Nature cover story, has achieved 3.5M+ downloads and 7,500+ GitHub stars, and is deployed in production across healthcare (Oxford Cancer Analytics for lung disease detection) and industrial applications (Hitachi for train failure prevention). In July 2026, less than 18 months after a €9M pre-seed round, Prior Labs joined SAP as an independent frontier AI lab, backed by over €1 billion in funding over four years. The company is a selective team of 40+ researchers and builders from Google, DeepMind, Meta, Apple, Amazon, Jane Street, and CERN, led by Frank Hutter, Noah Hollmann, and Sauraj Gambhir, with advisory support from Bernhard Schölkopf and Turing Award winner Yann LeCun.
The Head of Operations reports to Sauraj (Co-CEO, GTM and Operations) and owns operational excellence company-wide. As Finance, Legal, People, IT, InfoSec, and Compliance grow into dedicated functions, this leader partners with each function lead on the operational side of their work and integrates them into a cohesive system. Key responsibilities include:
• Building the operating engine for growth and scale: designing processes and structures that support rapid headcount, revenue, and complexity growth, anticipating operational bottlenecks before they constrain company velocity.
• Driving operational excellence across all functions: accountable for the operational dimensions of finance, people, legal, and back-office operations, with IT, InfoSec, and compliance managed through relevant leads. Sets standards and ensures nothing falls between functions.
• Resolving complex, cross-functional problems: brings clarity to ambiguity, convenes stakeholders, and drives projects to completion for company-wide benefit.
• Serving as a decision partner: frames trade-offs, surfaces risks early, and translates decisions into action so leadership operates from reliable data and sound judgment.
• Building and leading the operations team: hires, develops, and inspires an operations team that scales with the company, setting an execution standard that raises the bar across the organization.
The ideal candidate will be based at one of Prior Labs' hubs in New York or Berlin, though exceptional remote/hybrid candidates may be considered.
REQUIREMENTS:
Essential:
- High-growth experience: demonstrated track record operating inside a rapidly scaling company, understanding what breaks at each growth stage, and building processes and structures that scaled through multiple inflection points.
- Global operating experience: has run operations across multiple countries and regions, comfortable managing a company across time zones and jurisdictions.
- Broad operations ownership: has driven operational excellence across two or more of finance, people, legal, and business operations as a senior generalist, partnering with specialist leads rather than owning their decisions.
- Leadership capability: builds and develops strong teams; is the kind of operator other excellent operators want to work with.
A big plus:
- Experience in data, developer tools, or AI markets, with comfort working credibly alongside technical, research-led teams.
- Has built an operations function that grew with a company from startup to significant scale.
What enables success in this role:
- Energized by building systems that unlock the next growth stage, not maintaining status quo.
- Radical ownership: runs at difficult problems and resolves them rather than escalating.
- Practical and pragmatic: builds scalable processes without bloat, using appropriate structure for the moment.
- Calm and decisive under ambiguity and competing priorities; sets that standard for the team.
