Data Center Sourcing Manager

Groq • San Francisco, CA

11d • Hybrid

About The Position

Groq Inference is the engine that powers AI, and Groq was built from the silicon up to deliver the world's fastest inference at scale. We pioneered the LPU—the first processor designed specifically for AI inference—and are transforming that innovation into a global cloud platform powering production AI workloads. With the capital, infrastructure, and team to execute, we're uniquely positioned to define the next era of AI infrastructure. The opportunity is massive, and it's still wide open. Now let's go build it! Mission: As an Infrastructure Sourcing Manager, you will own data center sourcing end to end: building the pipeline of site opportunities, leading technical and commercial due diligence, negotiating with landlords and colocation providers, and presenting site recommendations to executive leadership for approval. This is a single-threaded owner role. You will partner across Engineering, Networking, Operations, Finance, and Legal, but you will be the person accountable for finding sites, proving they fit, and closing them on the best terms available. You will sit in the Finance organization and report to the Head of FinOps at Groq. Location: We prioritize hiring in or near the SF Bay Area, New York City and Dallas.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent practical experience.
• 7+ years of experience in data center site selection, colocation sourcing, infrastructure development, commercial real estate, capacity delivery, or strategic sourcing for mission-critical infrastructure.
• Demonstrated ownership of site or capacity transactions end to end — sourced, diligenced, negotiated, and closed.
• Experience negotiating colocation agreements, leases, or comparable infrastructure contracts, including power, SLA, and delivery terms.
• Working knowledge of data center power and cooling infrastructure sufficient to evaluate provider claims and partner credibly with engineering.
• Experience presenting recommendations to executive leadership and driving capital decisions.
• Comfortable working in fast-moving, ambiguous environments as an individual contributor without a supporting team.
• Willingness to travel as needed, up to approximately 30%.

Nice To Haves

• Experience in Telecommunications or Large enterprise network and datacenter sourcing
• Development-side perspective on data center economics, including yield-on-cost, cap rates, and how value is created in development.
• Familiarity with AI and GPU deployment requirements — high-density racks, direct-to-chip liquid cooling, and the constraints they place on site selection.
• Experience sourcing network or infrastructure equipment, or partnering closely with network engineering teams.
• Exposure to power procurement, including utility interconnection, tariffs, PPAs, and energy markets.
• Existing relationships across data center developers, operators, and brokers.
• Experience with procurement and ERP platforms, CRM-based deal pipeline management, and GIS or site evaluation tooling.

Responsibilities

• Build and maintain the relationship network that generates our site pipeline — data center developers, brokers, retail and wholesale colocation operators, power developers, and utilities — and translate those requirements into technical specifications and constraints that Direct Procurement sources against
• Develop and implement sourcing strategies for data center and telecoms infrastructure and services that optimize cost, quality, and delivery outcomes.
• Lead technical due diligence on candidate sites: power availability, utility interconnection and energization timelines, electrical topology and redundancy, rack density and liquid cooling readiness, structural and logistics constraints, fiber and carrier diversity, PUE, security and compliance posture, and commissioning evidence.
• Serve as the primary point of contact for site negotiations, structuring and closing LOIs, term sheets, colocation MSAs and service orders, leases, and powered shell agreements in partnership with Legal and Finance.
• Negotiate the commercial terms that drive our economics and risk position — $/kW-month pricing, NRC and MRC structure, escalators, PUE treatment, ready-for-service dates and delay credits, SLAs, ramp schedules, expansion rights, cross-connect pricing, liability, and renewal and exit terms.
• Assist in building the financial and operational case for each site — TCO, cost per MW, lease-versus-own and capex-versus-opex scenarios — and partner with FinOps and Finance on data center unit economics and capital planning.
• Drive cost savings and value improvements by leveraging market intelligence, competitive bidding, and value engineering initiatives to improve total cost of ownership (TCO) for data center assets.
• Implement and refine supplier selection processes and tools (e.g. RFI/RFP processes, supplier onboarding workflows, document management) to increase efficiency and ensure compliance with company policies and regulatory standards.
• Partner with networking engineering to understand the infrastructure required to deploy each GPU platform, and translate those requirements into sourceable BOMs for network, storage, admin, and supporting racks.
• Consult & inform infrastructure equipment procurement — covering switches and routers, optics and cabling, cooling hardware, storage and network racks, cabinets, PDUs, busway, pathway, and out-of-band management, alongside the Direct Procurement and Network Engineering teams.
• Maintain market intelligence on colocation pricing, supply trends, energy markets, and competitor activity, and manage contract hygiene and the renewal calendar across the portfolio.

Benefits

• Total Cash philosophy, which incorporates potential bonus value directly into base pay
• Long-Term Incentive (LTI) Program
• Robust suite of employee benefits

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior