Senior Director, Data Center Strategy

MACOM•Milpitas, CA

About The Position

MACOM is seeking a Senior Director of Data Center Strategy to lead the company's long-term strategic vision and growth initiatives within the rapidly-evolving AI and cloud data center market. This senior leader will serve as a company authority on data center and AI infrastructure trends, XPU roadmaps, high speed optical and electrical interconnect technologies, ecosystem competitive dynamics, and emerging technology trends. The Senior Director of Data Center Strategy will bridge technical expertise and business strategy, translating market opportunities, evolving customer needs, competitive intelligence, and technology shifts into actionable go-to-market strategies, growth initiatives, and new product investments. Working closely with business unit leadership, systems engineering, sales, marketing, and executive management, this individual will help define where and how MACOM will compete, company success factors, and necessary R&D investments required to sustain long-term growth.

Requirements

Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering, Physics, Computer Engineering, or related technical discipline.
15+ years of experience in strategy, product management, business development, applications engineering, or leadership roles within datacenter infrastructure, semiconductors, optical networking, or connectivity.
Deep understanding of AI networking infrastructure and architectures, data center interconnects, optical and electrical interconnect technologies.
Track record of strong customer engagements in the datacenter market. Ideal candidate will have experience engaging directly with hyperscale cloud providers, server OEMs, networking OEMs, ODMs, optical module manufacturers, or related ecosystem participants.
Strong business acumen with the ability to evaluate market opportunities, investment returns, and strategic growth initiatives.
Excellent communication and presentation skills with the ability to translate complex technical concepts into clear business outcomes.

Nice To Haves

MBA or advanced technical degree (MS or PhD).
Demonstrated experience developing long-range market strategies and translating technology trends into business opportunities.
Experience presenting to executive leadership teams, Boards of Directors, investment communities, and strategic customers.

Responsibilities

Drive MACOM's high level Data Center strategy and multi-year roadmap.
Identify and evaluate strategic market opportunities across AI infrastructure, cloud computing, networking, server architectures, and high-performance computing.
Develop recommendations regarding market participation, investment priorities, partnerships, acquisitions, and technology differentiation.
Serve as a strategic advisor to Business Unit leaders and executive management on market direction, served addressable market (SAM), growth opportunities, and competitive positioning.
Foster deep relationships across hyperscale cloud providers, XPU partners, networking OEMs, server OEMs, optical module manufacturers, and ecosystem partners.
Engage with strategic customers to understand future requirements, architecture transitions, challenges and unmet needs.
Monitor market trends, customer investments, competitive activity, and evolving technology roadmaps. Provide ongoing market intelligence and strategic insights to MACOM’s executive leadership and business units.
Anticipate technology inflection points and evolving industry standards in areas like optical networking architectures, co-packaged optics, silicon photonics, linear drive optics, active electrical cables, PCIe, CXL, Ethernet, and interface connectivity.
Assess potential disruptive technologies and competitive developments and recommend actions to ensure MACOM remains positioned at the forefront of industry innovation.
Translate market requirements and customer needs into product, technology, and platform priorities.
Partner with High Performance Connectivity, Lightwave, and other MACOM business units to influence long-range product planning.
Ensure product roadmaps anticipate future market shifts and support sustainable competitive differentiation.
Develop and maintain comprehensive Total Addressable Market (TAM) and Served Addressable Market (SAM) models.
Quantify growth opportunities, market share potential, customer adoption trends, and competitive positioning.
Develop executive-level reporting and recommendations based on data-driven insights.
Position MACOM as a recognized thought leader in AI infrastructure, optical networking, and next-generation data center technologies.
Help establish strategic messaging that resonates with customers, investors, and industry participants.
Develop compelling value propositions and positioning strategies that clearly articulate MACOM's advantages.
Partner with Marketing Communications to develop strategic content that supports customer engagement and market leadership.
Contribute to white papers, industry presentations, investor materials, blogs, conference content, newsletters, and strategic messaging.