Head of Demand / Supply Planning

Crux, Inc.; Palo Alto, Northern (CA, KY); Hybrid; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health, dental, and vision coverage

Life insurance and disability

401(k) with 4% company match

Hybrid schedule: four days in‑office +

Job summary

Crux, Inc. is building an integrated AI infrastructure company in the U.S. We are seeking a senior professional to own demand and supply planning across data center capacity, chips, racks, and networking by location and customer.

You will develop autonomous planning engines, forecast where capacity is needed, and collaborate across Sales, Sourcing, and Finance. The role emphasizes multi‑year planning, buffer policy, and data‑driven decision making in a fast‑growth environment.

Qualifications

• 8–10+ years in demand/supply, capacity, or integrated business planning for cloud, data center, hardware, or other capital‑intensive infrastructure.
• Built forecasting, inventory optimization, and replenishment systems that reconcile sales forecasts, constrained supply, and long‑lead‑time physical assets.

Responsibilities

• Own multi‑echelon capacity plan and lead integrated planning cadence.
• Forecast demand and supply and define trigger/lead times for capacity deployment.
• Manage capacity allocation for customer orders with reliable ETAs and scenarios.
• Develop autonomous planning/replenishment engines for forecasting and allocation.
• Collaborate with Sales, Sourcing, Capacity Delivery, Business Ops, and Finance.

Skills

Demand planning

Supply planning

Forecasting

Inventory optimization

Job description

Built to set the gold standard for integrated AI infrastructure

Crux AI is a newly formed, U.S.-based integrated AI infrastructure company created to remove the physical and operational constraints on consequential AI ambitions. Crux brings together power, high-density data centers, TPU silicon, networking, orchestration software, and ongoing operations as one integrated system.

Crux is being capitalized to plan every layer together, develop each one to demanding standards, and operate the whole system with efficiency and reliability. That gives hyperscalers, frontier AI labs, sovereign customers, enterprises, and AI-native companies greater freedom to pursue the AI they are here to create.

WHAT YOU'LL DO

You own matching demand and supply at every level of Crux’s stack — data center, chips, racks, and networking, by location and by customer — so that Crux meets its customer commitments and grows profitably.

In this role, you will:

• Manage a multi-echelon inventory with right-sized buffers, optimized against business goals to hedge both demand and supply uncertainty while respecting lead times and other business constraints.

• Forecast demand and supply at multiple levels with the accuracy the business can commit against, and you will build the systems that trigger build/lease decisions for data center space and the ordering of racks and networking equipment on time to meet service level and inventory goals.

• Manage customer orders, provide reliable ETAs for capacity delivery, optimize allocation decisions, and run scenarios with quantified impact so the business can make trade‑offs between utilization, margin, and speed. Doing this in a high‑growth, high‑uncertainty, high‑complexity environment requires building autonomous planning and replenishment engines that leverage AI, not a monthly spreadsheet reconciliation.

• Run the integrated planning cadence and own the capacity plan of record, and feed back what the plan reveals about where capacity is needed.

• Partner across Sales, Sourcing, Capacity Delivery, Business Operations, and Finance.

SIGNALS OF SUCCESS

After 60 days in this role:

• Delivered Crux’s first integrated capacity plan of record — demand and supply for data center and infrastructure delivery units by location and region — through Stage 1 completion, with a multi-year view beyond it.

• Stood up the demand forecast with Sales and the supply and site readiness views with Sourcing and Development on a shared model, with a first definition of inventory echelons, buffers, and lead times.

• Adapted to a fast‑paced environment, triaging appropriately and continuously improving our function.

After 6 months:

• Have the plan of record in active use by the organization for the financial plan, supply delivery and deployment sequencing and build planning.

• Have a multi‑-echelon inventory and buffer policy in place — data center, chips, racks, networking — with buffer sizes justified against demand and supply uncertainty, lead times, and service level and inventory goals.

• Have the triggers running for managing data center space and for ordering racks and networking equipment, tied to the plan of record and lead times.

• Manage customer orders and capacity allocation for Crux’s first set of customer contracts, with reliable delivery ETAs and a defined process for committing capacity, with Sales and Pricing.

• Run scenario analysis on supply delays, demand shifts, and site delays, with the utilization and margin impact of each quantified and agreed triggers and mitigations.

• Demonstrated an AI‑forward and automated approach to this role — you have built, in a hands‑on way, the first version of an autonomous planning and replenishment engine covering forecasting, supply/demand reconciliation, and allocation that the team uses every day.

After 1 year in, you will:

• Have delivered a plan that Crux executed against for Stage 1, with forecast accuracy, service level, and inventory performance tracked against targets and fed back into the models.

• Have extended the plan of record through the Stage 2 build and the first TPU generation transition, with a forward view of demand, committed capacity and buffers.

• Run demand/supply planning as a repeatable, largely autonomous function — planning and replenishment engines in production, exceptions managed by people — and be positioned to build and lead the planning function as Crux scales.

EXPERIENCES, ATTRIBUTES AND MINDSET THAT INDICATE A GOOD MATCH

Experiences

• 8–10+ years in demand/supply, capacity, or integrated business planning for cloud, data center, hardware, or other capital‑intensive infrastructure.

• Built forecasting, inventory optimization, and replenishment systems that reconciled sales forecasts, constrained supply, and long‑lead‑time physical assets, with the quantitative and modeling depth to do the work yourself.

Attributes

• You are outcome driven and hands on.

• You are the honest broker between functions.

Mindset

• You have a high tolerance for ambiguity.

• You think in scenarios over years, not point estimates for this quarter. You are comfortable committing to a plan while being explicit about the range around it, what would change it, and what it costs in utilization and margin.

Nice to have (preferred, not require)

• Direct experience planning accelerated compute capacity — GPU or TPU fleets, cluster deployments, or AI infrastructure.

• Familiarity with data center development timelines, power procurement, and site readiness milestones.

• Background in operations research, supply chain optimization, or S&OP systems implementation in a fast‑growing company.

Salary Range Information

The annual salary range for this position has been estimated based on market data and other factors. However, a salary higher or lower than this range may be appropriate for a candidate whose qualifications differ meaningfully from those listed in the job description.

About Crux

• We offer generous base, bonus and additional incentive based compensation

• Health, dental, and vision coverage for you and your dependents

• Company-paid life insurance and disability

• Full suite of other optional benefits

• 401(k) Plan with 4% company match

• Hybrid schedule offering four days in‑office collaboration paired with one remote workday for focused, individual work