Finance Manager at Watney (San Francisco, CA)
Watney· San Francisco, CA·
Role details
Job description
Our Mission
Expand human ambition in the physical world.
Critical infrastructure is constrained by labor shortages, hazardous working conditions, and operational complexity. Watney builds and deploys autonomous robotic systems that increase the speed and capacity of buildout, starting with data centers.
About the Role
At Watney, the Finance Manager is the first dedicated finance hire. This role owns financial strategy: building the forecasting, cash management, and reporting structure the company needs as it grows, and becoming the strategic partner leadership relies on to make spend decisions. This person will build the function from scratch, helping the company navigate new site leases, manufacturer builds, and vendor contract negotiation.
What You'll Do
- Build financial planning, reporting, and budgeting processes from the ground up.
- Own cash management and forecasting.
- Bring vendor contracts and spend approvals under real financial process.
You May Be a Good Fit If You:
- Have built a finance function at an early-stage startup from close to zero.
- Have modeled cash and capital needs through a manufacturing or hardware scale-up.
- Are comfortable being the first finance hire with no existing systems to inherit.
We’re committed to building a diverse, inclusive team. At Watney Robotics, we welcome people of all backgrounds and identities, and we make hiring decisions based on skills, experience, and potential. If you’re passionate about robotics but don’t meet every requirement, we still encourage you to apply!
Why work at Watney
- In-Office culture: All roles are based in San Francisco (HQ); the company emphasizes in-person collaboration.
- Ground-floor opportunity: With outsized ownership and visibility, employees shape the “rollout playbook” for a category-defining robotics company.
- Technical challenge: Work on real systems that combine robotics, AI, hardware, and infrastructure at scale.
- Notable peers: Colleagues include alumni from Scale AI, Amazon Web Services, Tools for Humanity, Warburg Pincus, and the US Army Corps of Engineers.
- Growth trajectory: A very young company (founded 2024) with rapid hiring and clear product-market fit, ideal for early-stage career builders.