Senior Program Manager (Product Development)

About Us : AI compute is hitting a hard physical wall, and memory bottlenecks are throttling the entire industry. Founded in October 2024 and backed by €57M in funding, Vertical Compute is solving this with proprietary Vertical Integrated Memory (VIM™) chiplets, making AI hardware faster, greener, and vastly more scalable. We are an interdisciplinary team transforming breakthrough semiconductor physics into commercial reality.

Why Now : After 18 months of intensive R&D, Vertical Compute has reached a critical inflection point. Our underlying technology is validated, and we have successfully met our core technical milestones. Armed with a proven technical data package and ongoing system studies, we are now shifting from pure R&D to active engagement with global enterprise customers. As we prepare for our next phase of scale and growth starting in 2027, joining us today means taking direct ownership of the hardware foundation that will power the next era of AI compute.

About the role

You will oversee key technical initiatives to deliver our unified hardware and software platform. You will play a crucial role in transitioning products from initial development into commercial production. Taking full ownership of execution, you will bridge technology delivery with strategic commercial goals.

Key responsibilities

• Own the cross-functional execution framework for complex silicon and software development programs from early architecture through tapeout, post-silicon bring-up, and release.

• Partner closely with hardware, software, architecture, and product teams to drive alignment on milestones, roadmaps, and execution reviews.

• Establish scalable execution practices, manage program dependencies, and proactively mitigate risks across hardware and software integration efforts.

• Manage cross-functional dependencies and program delivery flow to ensure seamless execution.

• Drive regular program-level product demonstrations to validate milestones and gather stakeholder feedback.

• Lead continuous improvement initiatives to refine operational processes and team coordination.

• Proactively identify and resolve architectural or organizational blockers, managing risk and maintaining relentless progress from initial exploration to customer acceptance.

• Identify execution risks, lead risk mitigation plans, and drive trade-off decisions across scope, schedule, resources, and quality

About the team

This role is part of the operations team, partnering closely with our cross-functional engineering teams in System & Product and Memory Design. We foster a highly collaborative, inclusive environment where strong alignment, high transparency and seamless team coordination are central to our shared success.

• About who you are:

• Masters or higher in Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, Physics or a related technical field. Ability to understand the system and the sub-systems.

• Strong technical foundation in hardware design, memory architecture, advanced packaging, chiplets, and AI acceleration technologies.

• Proven track record in technical program management within the semiconductor industry, with experience delivering complex products that integrate novel hardware with firmware.

• Data-driven; actively leveraging AI tools in daily workflows.

• Relentless Improvement Mindset.

• Adaptive and servant leadership style and problem-solving fluency in a cross-functional organization working on complex hardware-software integration.

• Fluency in English with strong written and verbal communication abilities.

Location : Leuven (Belgium) / Grenoble (France) / Remote. Regular travel is expected to support effective and efficient collaboration and keep pace with our rapid growth.