Strategic Finance, Hardware R&D Finance Manager

OpenAI•San Francisco, CA

53d•Hybrid

About The Position

The Strategic Finance team provides financial insights and guidance to support the organization's long-term goals and strategies. We partner across the business to allocate and deploy our resources for the highest impact outcomes. About the Role We are hiring a Hardware Finance Manager, R&D to own the financial strategy, investment modeling, and long-range planning for our hardware R&D programs. This role sits at the intersection of Hardware Engineering, Product, and Finance, and is responsible for ensuring that R&D roadmap decisions—spanning technical scope, sequencing, resourcing, and timelines—are grounded in rigorous financial analysis and disciplined capital allocation. This role will serve as the embedded finance partner to Hardware Engineering and Product teams, with end-to-end ownership of R&D investment models, program-level financials, and long-range planning across the hardware development lifecycle. You will help leadership evaluate tradeoffs across technical ambition, speed, risk, and capital efficiency as hardware programs scale in scope and complexity. We have a strong preference for candidates who can be based in our San Francisco HQ. We use a hybrid work model of 3 days in the office per week and offer relocation assistance to new employees.

Requirements

8+ years of progressive finance experience with significant exposure to hardware, manufacturing, or complex supply chain businesses.
A passion for helping build world-class finance teams and driving business and financial outcomes, as measured on margin improvement, working capital efficiency, forecast accuracy, and execution of cost-reduction initiatives.
A strong ability to critically evaluate opportunities and risks.
Expert modeling skills with best-in-class attention to detail and unwavering commitment to accuracy.
Exemplary ability to distill complex financial information into actionable insights.
Excellent communication skills and “story telling” ability when presenting data insights.
Strong enthusiasm for building the human-computer interface for the AI era.

Responsibilities

Own end-to-end hardware R&D financial models across the development lifecycle, from early concept and prototyping through development, validation, and transition to production.
Serve as a key finance partner to Hardware Engineering and Product leadership, supporting decisions on roadmap sequencing, technical scope, resourcing levels, and investment pacing through clear financial frameworks and scenario analysis.
Translate technical roadmaps into financially grounded R&D execution plans, integrating assumptions around headcount ramps, staffing mix, tooling, lab and test infrastructure, and development timelines.
Drive capital discipline and investment efficiency, proactively identifying scope changes, resourcing inefficiencies, and investment risks before spend becomes structurally locked in.
Own R&D forecasting, budgeting, and variance analysis, providing clear visibility into spend vs. plan, key drivers of change, and implications for broader hardware investment priorities.
Frame program-level tradeoffs and decision scenarios for leadership, clearly quantifying implications across cost, schedule, technical risk, and long-term platform value.
Build and maintain standardized R&D investment dashboards and program views to provide consistent, executive-ready visibility into burn rates, milestone progress, and capital allocation.
Support portfolio-level decision-making by comparing investment profiles across hardware programs and generations, informing prioritization, sequencing, and long-term R&D strategy.
Contribute to the development and scaling of the hardware R&D finance foundation, improving modeling rigor, governance, and decision support as the hardware portfolio grows.

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