Senior Bid Lead for Complex Tech & Defence Proposals

HENSOLDT South Africa; Pretoria; On-site; ZAR 1,000,000 - 1,400,000; Full time

Job summary

HENSOLDT South Africa is seeking an experienced Bid Manager to lead end-to-end bid lifecycle across complex engineering and defence proposals, ensuring compliance, technical soundness, and competitive pricing aligned with customer requirements.

The role requires strong governance, cross-functional collaboration with Engineering, Finance, Legal, and Sales, and a proven track record in cost estimation, pricing, and commercial analysis to win strategic opportunities.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in engineering, Business, Finance, Project Management, or a related discipline.
• Minimum 5 years' experience in bid management, proposal development, commercial management, or contract coordination within a defence, engineering, technology, or high-reliability environment.
• Proven experience managing complex bids involving technical, commercial, contractual, and financial components.
• Demonstrated experience in cost estimation, pricing strategy, financial modelling, and commercial analysis.
• Experience working with cross-functional teams including Engineering, Finance, Portfolio Management, Programmes, Legal, Operations, and Sales.

Responsibilities

• Bid Planning, Management and Submission: manage end-to-end bid lifecycle from opportunity qualification through submission by coordinating bid activities, schedules, governance reviews, stakeholder inputs, and submission requirements to ensure compliant, competitive, and timely proposals that support business growth objectives.
• Technical Solution and Proposal Development: lead the development, consolidation, and documentation of customer requirements, technical solutions, scope definitions, compliance responses, assumptions, and deliverables in collaboration with cross-functional stakeholders to ensure accurate, compelling, and fully traceable proposals that align with customer expectations and organisational capabilities.
• Costing, Commercial Management and Pricing Strategy: develop and validate bid costing, pricing models, financial analyses, commercial assumptions, and standardised pricing frameworks in collaboration with Finance, Portfolio, Programmes, and relevant stakeholders to ensure commercially sound, competitive, profitable, and consistently priced proposals aligned with business objectives.
• Risk, Governance and Contractual Compliance: identify and manage technical, commercial, contractual, financial, and delivery risks throughout the bid process while ensuring governance reviews, compliance requirements, executive approvals, and contractual obligations are effectively addressed to protect the business and improve bid quality and win probability.
• Stakeholder Collaboration, Handover and Continuous Improvement: facilitate collaboration between Sales, Engineering, Finance, Portfolio, Programmes, Operations, Legal, and customers throughout the bid lifecycle and post-award transition to ensure aligned decision-making, effective knowledge transfer, continuous improvement, and enhanced competitiveness in future opportunities.

Skills

Bid management

Proposal development

Commercial management

Cost estimation

Pricing strategy

Cross-functional collaboration

Governance & compliance

Education

Bachelor’s degree in engineering, business, finance, project management, or related discipline

Job description

HENSOLDT South Africa is seeking an experienced Bid Manager to lead end-to-end bid lifecycle across complex engineering and defence proposals, ensuring compliance, technical soundness, and competitive pricing aligned with customer requirements.

The role requires strong governance, cross-functional collaboration with Engineering, Finance, Legal, and Sales, and a proven track record in cost estimation, pricing, and commercial analysis to win strategic opportunities.