Solutions Architect Sr. Manager - Thermal
KEY RESPONSIBILITIES
Solution Architecture & Technical Leadership
- Lead the architecture and technical definition of thermal management solutions for complex data center and mission-critical infrastructure projects.
- Develop end-to-end cooling architectures covering:
- Air-cooled data center solutions
- Chilled water systems
- DX-based cooling systems
- CRAH and CRAC applications
- Chillers and heat rejection systems
- Cooling distribution systems
- Pumping and hydronic systems
- Economization strategies
- Liquid cooling architectures
- Direct-to-chip cooling
- CDU-based cooling systems
- High-density AI and HPC applications
- Translate customer IT loads, rack densities, redundancy requirements and growth plans into scalable thermal infrastructure architectures.
- Lead thermal capacity sizing and system dimensioning.
- Develop conceptual thermal layouts and cooling architectures.
- Evaluate cooling technologies and recommend the most appropriate architecture based on customer requirements, site conditions, efficiency targets and commercial considerations.
- Drive optimization of cooling system efficiency, energy consumption and overall data center performance.
- Support analysis and optimization of PUE and other relevant energy-efficiency parameters.
Customer Engagement & Solution Pursuit
- Act as the senior thermal technical authority during customer engagements and solution pursuits.
- Engage directly with customer engineering, facilities, data center and IT teams to understand requirements and translate them into solution architectures.
- Lead technical workshops, design discussions and customer presentations.
- Challenge customer requirements where appropriate and recommend alternative architectures that improve performance, scalability, resilience or total cost of ownership.
- Support early-stage opportunity identification and technical qualification.
- Participate in customer visits, technical presentations and strategic pursuits.
Solution Development & Proposal Support
- Lead the creation, review and approval of thermal solution architectures, conceptual designs, technical proposals, equipment selections, cooling system specifications, technical documentation, system sizing calculations and customer presentations.
- Work closely with commercial and estimating teams to develop technically accurate BOMs and quotations.
- Support cost and margin analysis and identify opportunities for solution optimization.
- Evaluate and integrate third-party equipment where required to deliver a complete customer solution.
Cross-Functional Leadership
- Partner with Power Solutions Architects to ensure integrated electrical and thermal infrastructure architecture.
- Work with Engineering teams to transition customer concepts into executable designs.
- Provide technical leadership and mentorship to solution architects and engineering teams.
- Support Sales teams through technical training and solution enablement.
- Influence product and solution roadmaps based on customer and market requirements, particularly in high-density computing, AI and HPC.
QUALIFICATIONS & EXPERIENCE
- Bachelor's or Master's degree in Mechanical Engineering, Thermal Engineering, HVAC Engineering or a related discipline.
- Typically 12–20+ years of progressive experience in thermal management, HVAC, mission-critical infrastructure or data center cooling.
- Demonstrated experience architecting complex data center cooling solutions.
- Strong expertise in HVAC and thermal infrastructure systems.
- Experience with high-density data centers, AI/HPC environments and liquid cooling solutions will be highly preferred.
- Strong understanding of data center availability and redundancy architectures.
- Experience working directly with large enterprise, hyperscale, colocation or telecom customers.
- Strong commercial awareness and ability to balance technical optimization with cost and business objectives.
- Excellent presentation, communication and customer engagement skills.
- Ability to influence senior technical and business stakeholders.
PREFERRED EXPERIENCE
- Experience in a data center OEM, cooling OEM, EPC, MEP consultancy, hyperscaler or colocation provider.
- Experience with global data center projects.
- Experience with liquid cooling and AI infrastructure is strongly preferred.
- Experience leading cross-functional technical teams.