Strategic Finance Lead - Compute

Perplexity; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

Perplexity in San Francisco is seeking a Strategic Finance Lead to optimize GPU compute investments and guide capacity decisions. You will become the go-to finance partner for inference and infrastructure teams, building models from token-level costs to long-range planning and pricing strategies.

You will own internal-cost analyses, surface optimization opportunities, and translate complex infrastructure dynamics into clear financial narratives for leadership.

Qualifications

• Demonstrated ability to build complex financial models for large infrastructure assets.
• Experience partnering with engineering, infrastructure, and procurement teams.
• Proven track record translating technical data into clear business narratives.

Responsibilities

• Finance lead for GPU compute spend, budgeting, forecasting, variance analysis, and plan maintenance.
• Build bottoms-up financial models for GPU fleet, capacity forecasts, and scenarios.
• Develop expertise in GPU contracts, pricing, and cost drivers to surface optimization.
• Own compute capacity plan, utilization truth source, and vendor/clusters spend.
• Create internal token-cost curves and translate to token pricing.
• Analyze ROI of in-house inference/training, guiding capacity deployment decisions.
• Collaborate with inference and infrastructure teams to align technical and financials.

Skills

Strategic finance

Financial modeling

Data synthesis

Communication to non-finance audiences

Cross-functional partnership

Capital efficiency

Operational execution

Tools

Financial modeling tools

Job description

About the Role

We are seeking a Strategic Finance Lead for our GPU compute fleet. In this role, you will be a key partner to our inference and infrastructure teams, providing financial expertise to optimize our compute investments and drive capacity decisions.

In this role, you'll develop deep expertise in the economics of AI compute, from token-level serving cost to the long-range financial planning of our GPU fleet. You'll build the models that inform Perplexity's capacity and make-versus-buy decisions, own the internal-cost analysis that underpins internal and external token pricing, and translate complex infrastructure dynamics into clear financial narratives for leadership.

This is a high-impact role for someone who thrives at the intersection of finance and infrastructure, and who is energized by building frameworks from scratch in a fast-moving environment.

This position is based in San Francisco and requires in-person attendance 2-3 days per week.

Key Responsibilities

• Finance lead for GPU compute spend, including budgeting, monthly forecasting, variance analysis, and financial plan maintenance

• Build and maintain detailed bottoms-up financial models for the GPU fleet, including capacity forecasts, cost driver analyses, and investment scenario modeling

• Develop deep expertise in GPU vendor contracts, pricing structures, and cost drivers, and surface optimization opportunities across the fleet

• Serve as subject matter expert for Perplexity's compute capacity plan, owning source of truth on utilization, committed-versus-consumed spend, and capacity by vendor and cluster

• Build internal token-cost curves distinguishing marginal from fully loaded serving cost, and translate them into internal and external token pricing

• Analyze the ROI of in-house inference and training, including opportunity cost across chip types, cluster configurations, and workloads, distilled into a framework for capacity deployment

• Partner closely with inference and infrastructure engineering to understand how serving and training workloads scale, and translate those technical dynamics into financial frameworks

You May Be a Good Fit If You Have

• Exceptional analytical skills with an ability to synthesize data into compelling insights and develop complex financial operating models

• Extraordinary problem-solving and critical thinking abilities to develop new frameworks for assessing utilization and capital efficiency in a rapidly evolving industry

• Attention to detail and patience for getting to the source of truth on complex and interconnected contract and usage data

• Comfort being the finance person in the room with engineering leads and vendor counterparts, and adept at communicating complex financial information to non-finance audiences

• A proven track record of partnering with technical teams to drive financial optimization initiatives, building enough trust to become indispensable to their roadmap and resourcing decisions

• A bias toward action, strong work ethic, and experience driving operational outcomes under tight timelines

• Background in AI, ML, or high-performance, large-scale computing infrastructure, including data centers and cloud service providers

Preferred Qualifications

• 4+ years of experience in strategic finance, infrastructure investment, private equity, growth equity, consulting, or investment banking, preferably with infrastructure or datacenter experience

• Experience in cloud or GPU infrastructure financial management, including direct work with major cloud service providers or neoclouds

• Direct experience with committed-use economics — reserved capacity, savings plans, committed-use discounts — and GPU procurement

• Deep expertise in GPU vendor economics, contract structures, and pricing models

• Experience with chip architecture economics and optimization strategies

• Proficiency with financial modeling tools