Senior Manager, AI Technical Program Manager

SATS Ltd.; Singapore; On-site; SGD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

SATS Ltd. is seeking a Senior Manager Technical Program Manager to drive execution across a fast-growing AI Centre of Excellence.

You will own the program management layer across GenAI, Computer Vision, Optimization, and Digitalization, translating the AI lead's roadmap into a resourced, sequenced delivery plan. You will coordinate between engineering and business units, manage senior stakeholders, and ensure timely delivery without writing production code.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in a technical field (CS/Engineering/IS) or equivalent experience.

Responsibilities

• Own end-to-end planning and tracking for AI/ML, GenAI, CV, Optimization, and Digitalization initiatives.
• Build and maintain the master roadmap across all AI COE workstreams.
• Identify cross-team dependencies and blockers early and drive them to resolution.
• Manage hiring/onboarding timeline for the AI COE build-out with HR.
• Coordinate between engineers and business stakeholders to align on sequencing and shared infrastructure needs.

Skills

Program management

Stakeholder management

Technical fluency

Communication

Hiring management

Planning & scheduling

Education

Bachelor's or Master's in technical field

Tools

Cloud platforms

Job description

About Us

Headquartered in Singapore, SATS Ltd. is one of the world’s largest providers of air cargo handling services and Asia’s leading airline caterer. SATS Gateway Services provides airfreight and ground handling services including passenger services, ramp and baggage handling, aviation security services, aircraft cleaning and aviation laundry. SATS Food Solutions serves airlines and institutions, and operates central kitchens with large-scale food production and distribution capabilities for a wide range of cuisines.

Job Description

About Us

Headquartered in Singapore, SATS Ltd. is one of the world’s largest providers of air cargo handling services and Asia’s leading airline caterer. SATS Gateway Services provides airfreight and ground handling services including passenger services, ramp and baggage handling, aviation security services, aircraft cleaning and aviation laundry. SATS Food Solutions serves airlines and institutions, and operates central kitchens with large-scale food production and distribution capabilities for a wide range of cuisines.

SATS is present in the Asia-Pacific, the Americas, Europe, the Middle East and Africa, powering an interconnected world of trade, travel and taste. Following the acquisition of Worldwide Flight Services (WFS) in 2023, the combined SATS and WFS network operates over 225 stations in 27 countries. These cover trade routes responsible for more than 50% of global air cargo volume. SATS has been listed on the Singapore Exchange since May 2000. For more information, please visit www.sats.com.sg

Why Join Us

At SATS, people are our greatest asset and we build our success on the knowledge, expertise and performance of every contributor, by embracing diversity and uniqueness. As part of our holistic approach and commitment to embracing FAM (Fulfilling, Appreciated, Meaningful) in the workplace, we offer the runway to develop Fulfilling careers that foster your career growth, recognising and Appreciating the strength of talent and capabilities that we continue to build internally; and inspiring and encouraging each other to make Meaningful contributions in the work we do at SATS.

Key Responsibilities

This is a Senior Manager Technical Program Manager role for someone who wants to drive execution across a fast-growing AI Centre of Excellence without being the one writing the production code. You will own the program management layer that sits across GenAI, Computer Vision, Optimization, and Digitalization workstreams — turning the Head of AI's roadmap into a resourced, sequenced, tracked delivery plan, and keeping cross-functional dependencies (engineering, business units, vendors, work-pass/hiring timelines) from silently slipping.

You are the key coordinator between engineering execution and business stakeholders: technical enough to understand what the Lead AI/Platform Engineer and AI Engineers are building and where the real risks are, and senior enough to manage up to leadership and across to different business units who depend on these systems.

This role suits someone from a Technical Program Manager, Senior Project Manager, or Engineering Program Manager background — ideally with prior exposure to AI/ML, data platform, or cloud infrastructure programs — who wants a dedicated, senior PM seat inside a technical org rather than a generalist PMO role.

Program & Delivery Management

• Own end-to-end planning and tracking for AI/ML, GenAI, CV, Optimization, and Digitalization initiatives — scope, milestones, resourcing, and critical path
• Build and maintain the master roadmap across all AI COE workstreams; keep it current as priorities shift
• Identify cross-team dependencies and blockers early, and drive them to resolution rather than just reporting them
• Manage the hiring/onboarding timeline for the AI COE build-out (offer-to-start sequencing, notice periods, work-pass lead times) alongside HR

Cross-Functional Coordination

• Coordinate between the Lead AI/Platform Engineer, Senior/Junior AI Engineers, and the CV/Optimization/Digitalization leads to align on sequencing and shared infrastructure needs
• Run planning ceremonies (sprint/iteration planning, roadmap reviews, retrospectives) suited to a mixed research/engineering team
• Surface resourcing conflicts (e.g. shared platform capacity across workstreams) to the Head of AI with options, not just problems

Stakeholder & Vendor Management

• Act as the primary point of contact for business-unit stakeholders (Cargo Handling, Ground Handling, Ground Freight, Food Solutions) on AI project status, timelines, and asks
• Manage vendor and external partner engagements (cloud providers, specialist agencies, tooling vendors) where they intersect with program delivery
• Translate between business requirements and technical scope in both directions

Risk, Governance & Reporting

• Maintain program-level risk and issue logs; elevate proactively with mitigation options
• Own steering-committee and leadership reporting — status, budget/headcount tracking against the hiring plan, and delivery health
• Ensure programs meet relevant compliance, data governance, and Fair Consideration Framework/work-pass requirements in coordination with HR/legal

Technical Fluency

• Understand enough of the underlying architecture (ML/GenAI pipelines, cloud infrastructure, model serving) to ask the right questions, sanity-check estimates, and assess technical risk — without being expected to write production code
• Partner with the Lead AI/Platform Engineer to keep the technical roadmap and program plan in sync

Key Requirements

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in a technical field (Computer Science, Engineering, Information Systems) or equivalent experience.
• With minimum 8 years of program/project management experience, with a track record of directly managing complex, multi-team technical programs — ideally in AI/ML, data platform, or software engineering organizations.
• Demonstrated ability to manage senior stakeholders and business-unit leaders, not just engineering teams.
• Strong working technical fluency: able to read an architecture diagram, understand cloud/infra and ML/GenAI concepts well enough to evaluate risk and effort, and hold engineers accountable to estimates.
• Excellent written and verbal communication — comfortable producing leadership-ready status reports and steering-committee materials.
• Experience managing hiring pipelines, budgets, or headcount plans alongside HR/Talent Acquisition.
• Project/program management certification preferred (PMP, PgMP, or Agile/Scrum equivalent).