Senior Staff Commodity Manager, Mechanical

Job description

### **Company Overview** Mainspring Energy is revolutionizing power generation with the world’s most flexible and adaptable local power generation technology, the Mainspring Linear Generator. Commercial, industrial, and utility leaders are choosing Mainspring over traditional options like engines, turbines, and fuel cells to quickly and reliably deliver local power for EV charging, commercial facilities, data centers, and grid-scale operations. The Mainspring Linear Generator is fuel flexible, ramps up and down to meet demand, and utilizes a flameless reaction with near-zero NOx emissions. Backed by top-tier investors including Khosla Ventures, Bill Gates, American Electric Power, Lightrock, and General Catalyst Mainspring designs, manufactures and delivers its products to customers across the U.S. today, and we’re quickly scaling for international expansion. Inspired by our vision of the affordable, reliable, net-zero carbon grid, Mainspring is rapidly expanding within the $816B global electricity equipment market, and we’re hiring the best talent to meet growing customer demand around the globe. We welcome a broad range of backgrounds, experiences, and talents to bring fresh perspectives and ongoing innovation to our customers. We are looking to build relationships with people who share our values: **Pragmatic Optimism.** Building a new category of world-class power generation requires the optimism of ambition and creativity, balanced with practicality to solve problems efficiently. The challenges that arise are opportunities for growth. **Excellence without Ego.** We bring expertise and commitment to creating the best customer experience, from sales to deployment and service, just as we apply deep technical rigor to building and delivering world-class products. We strive for excellence and behave as leaders with the humility to acknowledge our challenges, both collectively and as individual contributors. **Proactive Collaboration.** The integration and cross-disciplinary nature of Mainspring’s business requires intentionally seeking out others who bring different skills, perspectives, and priorities. Our culture of inclusion and respect extends beyond our team to interactions with our partners and customers. More information can be found at [](http://www.mainspringenergy.com/) ### Job Overview Mainspring Energy is rapidly scaling production of its breakthrough Linear Generator technology, necessitating a highly experienced and strategic Senior Staff Commodity Manager to lead global sourcing for graphite materials and mechanical components - with a strong emphasis on isostatic impregnated graphite - and select critical mechanical components. This role is essential for developing and executing comprehensive sourcing strategies, managing supplier relationships, and ensuring the procurement of materials that meet stringent technical, quality, and commercial requirements. The ideal candidate will be accountable for the entire lifecycle of assigned commodities, including supplier identification, technical qualification, contracting, risk mitigation, and performance monitoring. Cross-functional collaboration with engineering, materials science, operations, and quality is essential to meet business objectives and drive continuous improvement, so there is a strong preference for this hire to be able to come on site regularly. ### Responsibilities - Own and execute global commodity strategies for complex mechanical components, including CNC machining, castings, forgings, sheet metal, weldments, heat-treated parts, thermal spray, and laser cladding - Lead the graphite materials category, defining commercial strategy for high-temperature sealing and high-performance applications in partnership with Engineering - Drive cost reduction through should-cost modeling, DFM collaboration, and scalable supplier strategies - Mitigate supply and technical risk through alternate sourcing, performance monitoring, and data-driven cost models - Establish sourcing standards, best practices, and commercial frameworks that scale across mechanical categories and influence broader Supply Chain strategy - Build long-term supplier partnerships that ensure quality, cost, delivery, and scalability beyond transactional sourcing - Expand and diversify the global supply base to support production scaling and the transition to high-volume manufacturing, while reducing supply risk and strengthening supply chain resilience - Lead sourcing and supplier development activities in China, managing regional risk and on-site engagement - Set and enforce supplier standards for quality, delivery, and compliance - Drive continuous improvement through joint process reviews, performance metrics and corrective actions - Lead negotiation and execution of MSAs and LTAs, including pricing, liability, capacity commitments, and service-level agreements ### Qualifications - 18+ years of experience in strategic sourcing, commodity management, or supply chain leadership - Strong background sourcing custom mechanical components and managing complex BOMs - Engineering degree (Mechanical, Materials, Chemical preferred) or equivalent technical background - Ability to rapidly absorb and operate in highly technical domains (e.g., advanced materials) - ERP and procurement analytics proficiency (e.g., SAP, Oracle, NetSuite) - Bay Area presence required ### Preferred Qualifications - Experience sourcing graphite materials for high-temperature or unlubricated applications - Mandarin proficiency - Advanced degree or CPSM/Six Sigma certification