Senior Director, Supply Chain and Strategic Sourcing

Xaira Therapeutics•South San Francisco, CA

About The Position

Xaira is an innovative biotech startup focused on leveraging AI to transform drug discovery and development. The company is leading the development of generative AI models to design protein and antibody therapeutics, enabling the creation of medicines against historically hard-to-drug molecular targets. It is also developing foundation models for biology and disease to enable better target elucidation and patient stratification. Collectively, these technologies aim to continually enable the identification of novel therapies and to improve success in drug development. Xaira is headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area, Seattle, and London. The Senior Director, Supply Chain and Strategic Sourcing will lead and integrate Xaira’s supply chain, procurement, and contract governance functions, ensuring reliable access to the external partners, platforms, and services that support Research, Biomedical AI, Platform Engineering, and Corporate teams. This role is responsible for establishing disciplined sourcing strategy, strengthening vendor management, building contract governance infrastructure, and ensuring operational continuity across critical suppliers and service providers. The individual will provide strategic oversight while elevating two existing functions, procurement and contracts, into a cohesive, scalable supply chain capability. Operating at the intersection of research, technology infrastructure, and external partnerships, This role is responsible for bringing strategic focus to how Xaira engages its external partners, ensuring that sourcing, vendor, and contract decisions serve the company's mission, growth, and long-term goals

Requirements

10+ years of experience in supply chain, procurement, or strategic sourcing leadership
Experience operating in biotech, life sciences, or technology-driven R&D environments
Demonstrated experience managing vendor ecosystems spanning cloud infrastructure, SaaS platforms, research services, or technical R&D environments
Prior responsibility for leading both sourcing and contract management functions
Proven ability to build structure and operational discipline in growth-stage organizations
Strong financial acumen, vendor risk management capability, and negotiation experience

Nice To Haves

Ability to ensure reliable supply and vendor performance across research services, cloud infrastructure, laboratory suppliers, and external partners while identifying and mitigating operational risks before they impact the organization.
Demonstrated ability to structure and lead complex negotiations across cloud infrastructure, software platforms, research services, and vendor agreements while balancing cost, flexibility, speed, and long-term value.
Ability to design and implement structured contract frameworks, approval workflows, and lifecycle management processes that create visibility, enforce standards, and reduce legal and financial exposure.
Strong analytical capability to model vendor spend, forecast commitments, evaluate total cost of ownership, and proactively surface financial and operational risk.
Ability to align Legal, Finance, Research, and Engineering stakeholders around sourcing strategy, vendor commitments, and contractual decisions while balancing operational needs and risk management.

Responsibilities

Develop and lead overall supply chain strategy
Ensure continuity, reliability, and risk mitigation across critical vendors and external partners
Oversee vendor selection, onboarding, performance monitoring, and renewal planning
Provide leadership with visibility into external dependencies and operational risk exposure
Map and monitor critical vendor dependencies across research services, cloud infrastructure, data providers, and platform suppliers
Guide category strategy development across cloud infrastructure, AI/ML platforms, research services, data providers, lab suppliers, and corporate systems
Oversee competitive sourcing processes and major vendor negotiations
Ensure cost discipline and long-term value across supplier relationships
Partner with Finance to strengthen forecasting, budget alignment, and spend transparency
Oversee contract negotiation and execution standards across MSAs, SOWs, SaaS agreements, data licenses, and research vendor agreements.
Ensure structured intake, review, and lifecycle management processes are followed
Establish clear governance for renewals, amendments, and contractual obligations
Strengthen coordination between Legal, Finance, and operational stakeholders
Build contract architecture that gives Legal and leadership a strategic view of risk
Lead and develop procurement and contracts team members
Establish performance expectations, KPIs, and operating cadence
Build scalable systems and processes appropriate for company growth
Elevate supply chain operations from reactive processing to a strategic operational partner