Chief of Staff - Hardware Projects

Hexa; Paris; Hybride; EUR 90 000 - 120 000; Plein temps

Résumé du poste

Hexa, a world-leading startup studio, is launching a new hardware vertical and is seeking a Chief of Staff to lead go-to-market and business development for two related projects in atmospheric water generation and satellite communications. You will identify targets, structure the commercial approach, and build strategic partnerships with industry players.

You will map markets, craft GTM plans, and personally prospect in long-cycle, industrial environments such as aerospace, energy, and data

Qualifications

• Solid experience in a hardware / industrial environment with long sales cycles and complex procurement.
• Existing network in industrial sectors such as aerospace, energy, defense, or data centers is a strong plus.
• Genuine go-to-market / business development appetite with comfort cold-calling in technical B2B worlds.

Responsabilités

• Mapping the market: identify first target accounts, decision-makers, and buying committees in industrial sectors.
• Building the go-to-market approach: structure how projects reach first customers and partners.
• Prospecting hands-on: personally conduct outreach and cold-calling in targeted industries.
• Developing partnerships: engage with industrial players, integrators, and institutional actors.
• Acting as right hand to founders: help structure priorities and coordinate across projects.
• Feeding learnings back into the projects: translate field feedback into sharper GTM decisions.

Description du poste

Location: Brussels or Paris - regular travel between the two expected

Type: Full-time

About Hexa

Hexa (formerly eFounders) gives entrepreneurs the best chances to build outstanding companies.

We are a pioneering, world-leading startup studio born in Europe that designs, builds and launches category-defining startups. We are today recognized as one of the best venture studios in the world, with a track record comparable to tier-1 VC funds.

We have created 60+ companies (including 3 unicorns) with a combined valuation of over $5 billion among them Aircall, Spendesk, Front, Swan and Yousign. We are passionate about B2B software, particularly AI-native and agentic SaaS, fintech, climate tech, defense tech and healthtech.

Hexa is in full growth mode, with three early-stage activities: our Ventures programs Hexa Start and Hexa Sprint which help entrepreneurs go from zero to one, and a PE program, Hexa Scale, which takes majority stakes in existing startups and pushes them to new thresholds.

A new hardware vertical at Hexa

We've just welcomed Guerric as a new Partner at Hexa, and he's launching our hardware vertical. Guerric is an engineer with a PhD in aerospace engineering. He co-founded ScanWorld, a satellite imagery analytics company, before spending a few years in nuclear energy, where he played a key incubator role in launching companies across fission, fusion and defense.

Guerric is building and scaling hardware startups within the studio, starting with two projects already validated and entering a critical growth phase:

• An atmospheric water generation project: producing drinking water from ambient air.
• A satellite communications project: space telecommunications infrastructure.

Two projects, two markets, one thing in common: relatively long sales cycles, complex procurement processes, and a need to land the first customers and partners in highly specific industrial environments.

The mission

We're looking for a Chief of Staff to support these two projects on their go-to-market and business development track. You'll be at the heart of building the commercial engine for these early-stage startups: identifying targets, structuring the commercial approach, making first contact, and developing strategic partnerships in sectors with long, complex sales cycles.

What you'll be doing

• Mapping the market: identifying the first target accounts, decision-makers, and buying committees in industrial sectors such as aerospace, energy, defense, and data centers.
• Building the go-to-market approach: structuring how each project reaches its first customers and partners, from outreach strategy to positioning.
• Prospecting hands-on: picking up the phone and cold-calling into specific B2B, industrial buying environments. This is not a delegated task, you'll be doing it yourself.
• Developing partnerships: engaging with industrial players, integrators, and institutional actors relevant to each project's ecosystem.
• Acting as a right hand to the founders: helping structure priorities, coordinate across the projects launched within the venture studio, and bring an operator's rigor to fast-moving, still-forming teams.
• Feeding learnings back into the projects: translating what you learn from the field (objections, buying criteria, procurement constraints) into sharper go-to-market decisions.

Who we're looking for

• Solid experience in a hardware / industrial environment, with long sales cycles and complex procurement (e.g., aerospace, energy, defense, infrastructure, or adjacent sectors).
• A background that combines a large industrial company (e.g., Airbus, Siemens, Rheinmetall, EDF, Thalès) with startup experience. We're looking for someone who also has a real hands‑on, scrappy startup layer.
• A genuine go‑to‑market / business development appetite: you're not afraid to cold‑call into specific, technical B2B worlds.
• An existing network in industrial sectors like aerospace, energy, defense, or data centers is a strong plus.
• Deep knowledge of the sector and its purchasing dynamics matters more than the exact title of your previous role.

Recruitment process

• First call with Laure - introduction to Hexa and a check on cultural fit.
• Interview with Guerric - mutual introduction, deep dive into the role, both projects, and our approach to management.
• Case study - an exercise inspired by our real projects (for example: identifying the first 10 contacts to reach out to for the water project).
• Final interview - with other team members