Technical Deployment Lead, Semiconductors

Details

About the Team

OpenAI’s Forward Deployed Engineering (FDE) team turns research breakthroughs into production-grade systems. We embed deeply with customers to solve high-leverage problems and act as the delivery engine for our most complex large-scale engagements. We move quickly from prototype to production and surface reusable patterns that shape our platform. We operate at the intersection of deployment and development — working closely with OpenAI Research, Product and Partnerships.

About the role

This is a founding role. As the first Technical Deployment Lead (TDL) for Semiconductors/Manufacturing, you will define how OpenAI delivers complex systems to customers. You will own how they are built, shipped, and adopted. You will translate business outcomes into a technical plan, run day-to-day execution across FDEs, Researchers, and Customer Engineers, and partner with customer teams to ensure delivery supports their goals.

You will focus on the Semiconductor vertical to deploy next-generation AI capabilities. You will own delivery end-to-end: embedding with customers to map workflows and success criteria, ensuring components ship on time, and leading readiness and change management for adoption. You will track progress, manage dependencies, make sequencing decisions, and drive 0→1 prototypes through MVP and scale. You will also share field insights with Product and Research to guide roadmap and priorities.

Success will be measured by impact — deployments that deliver measurable value against customer goals, drive adoption, and become critical to workflows. Additional measures of success include delivery reliability (milestones hit, low reopen/churn), operating leverage (patterns reused across deployments), judgment under pressure, and product impact (field signal that shifts roadmaps/architectures).

This is a high-trust, high-autonomy role requiring deep technical project management expertise, extreme ownership of outcomes, and an ability to immerse in customer workflows and partner with customer teams to solve complex engineering problems at pace.

This role is based in San Francisco with a hybrid model of 3 days in the office per week. Relocation assistance is offered. Travel up to 50% is required.

Responsibilities

• Own the technical delivery plan for multiple interdependent workstreams. Translate business objectives into a roadmap with milestones, dependencies, and acceptance criteria.
• Run day-to-day engineering execution. Track and drive delivery across OpenAI FDE and customer teams. Keep progress unblocked and sequenced. Make real-time trade-offs on scope and priority to protect the critical path.
• Embed with customer teams to land production deployments and drive adoption. Map workflows, shape tools/integrations, and translate requirements into a delivery plan. Lead onboarding, adoption, and change management.
• Partner with Product and Research so platform components and research workstreams land in time to support deployment goals.
• Codify solution patterns and evals. Extract reusable patterns and package field signals to improve product and models.
• Own value cases and ROI. Set impact hypotheses, baselines, and KPIs; run pre-/post-deployment measurement and report to executive sponsors.
• Shape how we engage Semiconductors/Manufacturing customers.

Requirements

• 7+ years of customer-facing technical delivery leadership.
• Expertise in Semiconductors / Manufacturing.
• Track record of successfully leading large, complex, high-stakes customer engagements where customer outcomes depended on tight coordination and fast decision making, ideally involving AI.
• Ability to excel in high-ambiguity environments and simplify complex, dynamic work.
• Ability to move between system-level understanding and execution-level detail; dive into customer workflows/data, map constraints, sketch architectures, and move ambiguous problems to shipped systems.
• Strategic thinking and pattern recognition; connect customer needs to scalable, reusable solutions.
• Strong technical fluency and sharp sequencing instincts; comfortable discussing technical details, pressure-testing architectures, and making trade-offs.
• Experience shipping AI/LLM systems and understanding solution patterns, integration basics, and production pitfalls.
• Executive presence and ability to translate complex technical trade-offs for business leaders and convert strategy into day-to-day technical execution.
• Willingness to be onsite with customers to accelerate delivery (often 25–50%, sometimes higher).

Benefits

• Base salary range: $280,000–$345,000 (offers equity; total compensation may include performance-related bonus(es) and equity).
• Medical, dental, and vision insurance with employer contributions to Health Savings Accounts.
• Pre-tax accounts for Health FSA, Dependent Care FSA, and commuter expenses.
• 401(k) retirement plan with employer match.
• Paid parental leave (up to 24 weeks for birth parents and 20 weeks for non-birthing parents), plus paid medical and caregiver leave (up to 8 weeks).
• Paid time off: flexible PTO for exempt employees and up to 15 days annually for non-exempt employees.
• 13+ paid company holidays and coordinated office closures, plus paid sick or safe time as required by law.
• Mental health and wellness support; employer-paid basic life and disability coverage.
• Annual learning and development stipend.
• Daily meals in offices and meal delivery credits as eligible.
• Relocation support for eligible employees.
• Additional taxable fringe benefits such as charitable donation matching and wellness stipends may be provided.

Additional notes

OpenAI is an equal opportunity employer and provides reasonable accommodations to applicants with disabilities. Background checks will be administered in accordance with applicable law. To report suspected non-compliance of this posting, OpenAI provides a reporting form.