---
title: 'Director of Strategic Sourcing at OLIX'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/director-of-strategic-sourcing-olix-austin-aw2h3484k1jh'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-09-13'
---

# Director of Strategic Sourcing at OLIX

- **Company:** OLIX
- **Location:** Austin, TX
- **Employment:** full-time
- **Work type:** onsite
- **Posted:** 2026-07-03
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-13
- **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/olix/9d05ced9-e90c-4338-b7a2-4a05d1421d3a

## Job description

## About OLIX

AI is growing faster than any technology in history and the explosion in demand has created a massive infrastructure gap; we can no longer build chips or power stations fast enough to keep up. The industry is still leaning on a ten-year-old hardware blueprint that has reached its limit. A new paradigm that is faster and more efficient will be the biggest economic opportunity of the next century and create the most important company of the next decade. The OLIX Decode Accelerator 1 (DX-1) is the first accelerator architected specifically for decode. Rack-scale co-design of logic, data movement, packaging, optics and interconnect enables a step change in system level performance.

## The Role

We are seeking an experienced Director of Strategic Sourcing to build and lead a world-class Global Supply Management (GSM) organization supporting the development and production of next-generation photonic and semiconductor products. This role is responsible for developing the company's global supplier ecosystem by establishing supplier strategies, commercial partnerships, and supplier management processes that enable the business to scale from early product development through high-volume manufacturing. Working closely with Engineering, Product, Operations, Manufacturing, Quality, and Finance, you will ensure our suppliers become a strategic competitive advantage through technology leadership, operational excellence, and long-term partnerships. This is a highly collaborative leadership role responsible for shaping the company's external manufacturing strategy across semiconductor fabrication, advanced packaging, photonics, optical components, electronics, precision mechanics, contract manufacturing, and capital equipment. You will partner with executive leadership and cross-functional teams to balance innovation, quality, cost, capacity, and supply continuity while building a resilient global supply network capable of supporting rapid company growth.

## Key Responsibilities

- Develop the supplier ecosystem: Develop the supplier ecosystem: Build a global supplier ecosystem spanning semiconductor fabrication, photonic manufacturing, electronics, precision mechanics, contract manufacturing, and capital equipment.
- Lead strategic partnerships: Lead strategic supplier partnerships through supplier selection, commercial negotiations, long-term agreements, supplier performance, and technology collaboration.
- Enable product scale: Partner with Engineering, Product Management, Operations, Manufacturing, Quality, and Finance to enable successful new product introduction, manufacturing readiness, and production scale.
- Secure long-term growth: Develop supplier, capacity, and manufacturing strategies that secure the partnerships, capabilities, and production capacity required to support long-term business growth while identifying and closing strategic supply gaps.
- Build a world-class organisation: Build and lead a Global Supply Management organization capable of scaling from early product development through high-volume manufacturing.

## Skills & Experience

- Bachelor's degree in a technical discipline.
- 12+ years of Global Supply Management or Supply Chain leadership experience within the semiconductor or photonics industries, including at least five years leading teams.
- Proven success developing global supplier strategies that enable product launches and manufacturing scale.
- Experience building strategic partnerships with semiconductor foundries, OSATs, contract manufacturers, and key suppliers.
- Strong commercial negotiation and contract management experience.
- Deep understanding of supplier selection, qualification, performance management, and supply risk management.
- Experience supporting outsourced manufacturing business models across semiconductor fabrication, advanced packaging, photonics, electronics manufacturing, precision mechanics, and final assembly and test.
- Strong business and financial acumen with the ability to evaluate supplier capabilities, manufacturing strategies, investment decisions, and commercial tradeoffs.
- Exceptional leadership, communication, and relationship-building skills with the ability to influence executive stakeholders and build high-performing teams.

## Nice to Have

- Bachelor's degree in Engineering.
- MBA or Master's degree.
- Experience applying Lean Six Sigma principles to supplier development, supplier performance, and manufacturing operations.

## Compensation & Equity

- Competitive Salary: Commensurate with your experience, skills, and location
- Equity & Ownership: Meaningful stock options. You’re not just joining the mission; you’re owning a piece of it
- Proximity Bonus: We value your time. To minimise your commute and maximise your life, we offer an annual Living-Local Bonus if your residence is within 20 minutes of the office
- Retirement Benefits: Employer-contributed retirement plans to help you build long-term financial security

Due to U.S. export control regulations, candidates’ eligibility to work at OLIX depends on their most recent citizenship or permanent residency status. We are generally unable to consider applicants whose most recent citizenship or permanent residence is in certain restricted countries (currently including Iran, North Korea, Syria, Cuba, Russia, Belarus, China, Hong Kong, Macau, and Venezuela). Applicants who have subsequently obtained citizenship or permanent residency in another country not subject to these restrictions may still be eligible.

## About OLIX

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: OLIX, formerly known as Flux, is building a new compute paradigm using an SRAM-architecture integrated with photonics to solve the fundamental memory, energy, and speed constraints in deploying frontier AI.
- **Entity Type**: Private, Series A (raised $220M in February 2026)
- **Headquarters**: London, United Kingdom
- **Founded**: 2024
- **Founders**: James Dacombe (CEO)

## Core Business
- **Primary industry/industries**: Semiconductor Manufacturing, AI Infrastructure, Photonic Computing
- **Target customers**: Enterprise AI labs, hyperscalers, and frontier AI model developers requiring high-throughput, low-latency compute
- **Mission or purpose statement**: "Solving the most consequential problem in the deployment of frontier AI" by building infrastructure that overcomes the limits of current GPU-based memory architecture.

## Products & Services
- **OLIX Compute Platform**: A new hardware architecture combining SRAM-based compute with integrated photonics, designed to surpass HBM-based systems on throughput per megawatt and total cost of ownership (TCO), while delivering significantly better interactivity and latency than silicon-only SRAM architectures.

## Market Standing
- **Valuation**: Unicorn status; estimated $1–2.5B (latest round Feb 2026, per Dealroom)
- **Key Metric**: $220M in total funding (Series A, led by Hummingbird Ventures, with participation from Crane Venture Partners and others)
- **Notable Investors/Partners**: Hummingbird Ventures (Series A lead), Crane Venture Partners (pre-seed lead), and 4+ additional investors across seed and Series A rounds.
- **Growth Signals**: Headcount grew 420% YoY to 70 employees; operating in 6 countries (UK, US, Canada, Armenia, Romania, Germany); active job postings surged 188.9% YoY with 26 open roles as of mid-2026.

## Competitive Advantages
- **Unique photonic-SRAM architecture**: A contrarian bet that GPU-based approaches cannot simultaneously deliver high throughput and high interactivity at low cost due to physical design constraints.
- **Talent density**: Heavy hiring from top compute and AI companies (Apple, Amazon, Arm, Google, Tenstorrent).
- **First-mover in inference-era compute**: Targeting a fundamental bottleneck as frontier models require vastly more tokens per inference.

## Strategic Focus
- **Scale teams**: Aggressively hiring across engineering (ASIC/photonic design, FPGA, optics, process integration), operations, and legal in London, Austin, Toronto, Bristol, and San Francisco.
- **Prototype and productize**: Moving from architecture conception into hardware integration and manufacturing (roles include Process Integration Engineer, Opto-Mechanical Engineer, Layout Engineering Manager).
- **Transition from Flux branding**: Rebranded to OLIX in January 2026 to signal a new phase of company identity and scale.

## Why Work Here
- **In-person culture**: OLIX is an in-person company. They incentivize living within a 20-minute commute of the office with a £24,000 annual living-local bonus.
- **Compensation**: Benchmark-leading base salary, meaningful stock options (early employees build significant ownership), and workplace pension.
- **Benefits**: Comprehensive BUPA medical & dental (with Medical History Disregarded), 25 days holiday + UK bank holidays + birthday leave, meals on-site, cycle-to-work scheme, nursery scheme, visa sponsorship and relocation support.
- **Engineering environment**: M4 Mac standard (M5 Pro upgrade for engineering), on-site 3D-printing lab, noise-cancelling headphones, fully ergonomic workstation, and a culture of deep focus.
- **Impact**: "You will work with some of the best minds in photonics, systems, and compute on one of the defining problems of our era."

## Sources
1. [olix.com](https://olix.com/)
2. [olix.com/careers](https://olix.com/careers)
3. [LinkedIn - OLIX](https://www.linkedin.com/company/olix-computing)
4. [Dealroom - OLIX](https://dealroom.co/companies/olix-1/)
5. [jobs.ashbyhq.com/olix](https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/olix)

## Other roles at OLIX

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- [IT Systems Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/it-systems-engineer-olix-london-dd8x13yc7gjp) — London, United Kingdom
- [Laser Architect](https://feeny.ai/job/laser-architect-olix-london-g0yh7pg0qg4e) — London, United Kingdom
- [Financial Controller](https://feeny.ai/job/financial-controller-olix-london-dj3nebzx9q5e) — London, United Kingdom
- [Director of Quality](https://feeny.ai/job/director-of-quality-olix-austin-1ky60e0vnf16) — Austin, TX
- [Staff / Senior Software DevOps Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/staff-senior-software-devops-engineer-olix-toronto-6k46f8e5maks) — Toronto, Canada
- [Infrastructure Manager](https://feeny.ai/job/infrastructure-manager-olix-london-pys2c3cv8qf2) — London, United Kingdom
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- [Senior Opto-Mechanical Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-opto-mechanical-engineer-olix-london-804ny5352m3v) — London, United Kingdom
- [Infrastructure Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/infrastructure-engineer-olix-london-39eswe03ks94) — London, United Kingdom