Procurement Manager (m/f/d) - Defense Tech
In this new role, you get the chance to own our procurement function in full responsibility from scratch based on your experiences and ideas. By leaving your footprint, you will centralize our international buying activities in an efficient and cost-saving way. As we continue to grow, this will lead to interesting career opportunities and a leadership perspective.
You will build our procurement function from scratch by establishing unified structures, standards, tools, and processes to implement purchasing as a strategic function. This is a role with a high degree of ownership, reporting directly to our COO.
Supplier Management & Negotiation
- Build and maintain a structured supplier portfolio mainly for all components needed for product development and production (hardware, electronics, mechanical parts, camera, sensors, services, etc.).
- Lead price, contract, and framework agreement negotiations with strategic partners and suppliers
- Develop a supplier evaluation system (quality, delivery reliability, pricing, security of supply) and conduct regular reviews.
- Establish second-source strategies and risk management for critical components, including handling long lead times and obsolescence.
- Work closely with Engineering and Product Management on the selection and qualification of new suppliers and partner products.
- Design and implement a unified purchase-to-pay process in close collaboration with our Finance department.
- Define procurement policies, approval thresholds, standard contract templates (incl. NDAs, quality assurance agreements), and purchasing terms.
- Select or expand suitable tools (Business Central, e-procurement) together with Finance and IT.
- Establish procurement KPIs and valuable management reporting.
- Handle day-to-day purchase order processing, including delivery tracking and escalation in case of supply shortages.
- Ensure material availability at any time.
- Resolve claims and deviations together with Quality Management and suppliers.
- Ensure export control requirements are addressed in procurement (incl. dual-use goods).
- Implement supply chain due diligence obligations and compliance requirements.
- Support requirements arising from security clearance regulations and customer audits.
- Degree in Business Administration, Industrial Engineering, Supply Chain Management, or a comparable qualification.
- 5+ years of experience in strategic and operational procurement, ideally in a tech scale-up with complex products (hardware, software, integration).
- Strong in contract negotiations and building solid supplier relationships.
- Experience in building or restructuring procurement processes and organizations (greenfield mindset).
- Confident use and implementation of ERP systems (f.e. Business Central).
- Ownership mentality, entrepreneurial mindset, number-driven and strong communicator.
- Passion for technical solutions and products.
- Business-fluent German and English.
- Willingness to travel and to work from the office in Munich or Berlin.
- Knowledge of export control regulations.
- Experience with procurement in regulated industries.
- Experience working with international suppliers.
- Citizenship of a NATO member country or close ally.
- Office first company.
- Interesting complex product environment with latest technologies (autonomy, AI, robotics).
- Purpose-driven mission.
- Strong international and agile culture.
- An environment for personal and professional growth.