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Salary: USD 217,000 - 252,000 / annual
Lightmatter is a venture-backed company leading the revolution in AI data center infrastructure. The company invented the world's first 3D-stacked photonics engine, Passage™, capable of connecting thousands to millions of processors at the speed of light for extreme-scale data centers supporting advanced AI and HPC workloads. The company raised $400 million in Series D at a $4.4 billion valuation.
We are hiring a Senior Staff Technical Program Manager to drive program execution across Lightmatter's Hardware Systems team. You will own program coordination across all hardware systems activities, maintaining integrated schedules across concurrent projects and workstreams, surfacing priority conflicts, and driving resolution of resource contention with engineering leads.
Your responsibilities span the full hardware development lifecycle, from design through production. You will manage dependencies and trade-offs across concurrent workstreams, facilitate alignment across internal and external stakeholders (including contract manufacturers, PCB and sheet metal fabricators, assembly houses, and other suppliers), and maintain program visibility for engineering leadership. You will coordinate material flow, track component orders and PCB fab runs, manage team-wide resource loading and capacity visibility, and serve as the primary hardware program interface with external partners.
This is a hands-on role combining strong program management fundamentals with working knowledge of hardware engineering. You will be equally comfortable in design reviews, supplier calls, resource planning discussions, and executive status updates. You will thrive in a fast-moving environment where requirements evolve and priorities shift, bringing clarity and structure to ambiguity.
Key responsibilities include: owning integrated schedules reflecting hardware development realities (bring-up milestones, NPI phases, EVT/DVT/PVT gates); managing team-wide resource loading; coordinating material flow and component tracking; driving cross-functional alignment between Hardware Systems and other teams; representing the Hardware Systems team in company-wide program reviews; tracking budgets for engineering activities, prototype builds, and tooling; and establishing lightweight program management processes.
QUALIFICATIONS:
- Bachelor's degree in Engineering or related technical field
- 5+ years of program management experience in hardware engineering with direct exposure to electrical and mechanical development cycles
- Proven track record managing concurrent engineering programs with shared resources and overlapping timelines
- Deep familiarity with hardware development processes across full lifecycle: PCBA and mechanical enclosures, PCB fabrication, system integration, bring-up, EVT/DVT/PVT, and production
- Proven experience coordinating with contract manufacturers (CMs) and ODMs to manage schedules, track deliverables, and resolve issues
- Hands-on experience with material flow, component tracking, and BOM management
- Skilled facilitator who drives productive meetings, captures critical context, and ensures action items are owned and closed
- Strong written and verbal communication skills, comfortable presenting program status and risk assessments to engineering leads and executives
- Expert in project management tools such as Microsoft Project, Jira, Smartsheet, or equivalent platforms
- Strong bias for action—consistently closes loops, follows up independently, and identifies potential slips before they impact timelines
- Thrives in fast-paced, ambiguous environments; proactively creates structure and drives clarity
PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS:
- Experience managing programs for complex hardware development
- Experience defining and improving program management processes in a startup or new business unit
