Senior Financial Planning and Analysis Analyst - Engineering & Product

Lambda, The Superintelligence Cloud, is a leader in AI cloud infrastructure serving tens of thousands of customers. Our customers range from AI researchers to enterprises and hyperscalers. Lambda's mission is to make compute as ubiquitous as electricity and give everyone the power of superintelligence. One person, one GPU.

If you'd like to build the world's best AI cloud, join us.

*Note: This position requires presence in our San Francisco or San Jose office location 4 days per week; Lambda's designated work from home day is currently Tuesday.

What You'll Do

Project Spend, Internal Capacity & Fleet Optimization

• Own project-level budgets, spend tracking, and cost-to-complete forecasts for Engineering and Product initiatives

• Quantify internal capacity consumption across development, testing, and benchmarking; build and maintain allocation and chargeback methodology

• Partner with Infrastructure and Engineering on fleet optimization, including utilization, idle capacity, instance mix, and reclamation opportunities

• Translate optimization opportunities into quantified savings and track realization against target

Product Investment ROI & R&D Analysis

• Build business cases and ROI models for product and R&D investments

• Establish post-investment measurement; track realized returns against the original underwriting

• Analyze R&D spend by initiative and support capitalization analysis with Accounting

• Provide prioritization frameworks and trade-off analysis for competing investment requests

New Product Introduction (NPI) Management

• Serve as the finance partner across the NPI lifecycle, from concept through launch and ramp

• Model pricing, unit economics, margin, and volume assumptions for new offerings

• Own stage-gate financial deliverables and launch readiness criteria

• Track post-launch performance against the launch case and inform go/no-go and scaling decisions

Engineering & Product Headcount and OpEx Management (BvA)

• Own OpEx and headcount planning, tracking, and reporting for the Engineering, Product, and Cloud Services organizations

• Maintain hiring plans, compensation assumptions, and organizational change tracking against approved headcount

• Prepare monthly and quarterly budget vs. actual analysis, identify key drivers, and partner with Engineering and Product leaders to explain performance

• Manage vendor, software, and tooling spend; support accrual and reclassification inputs with Accounting through the monthly close

Cash Flow Forecasting

• Build and maintain the operating cash flow forecast model, including timing of vendor payments, capacity commitments, and project spend

• Own the rolling near-term cash view; reconcile forecast to actuals and explain variances

• Model scenarios around deployment timing, payment terms, and financing structures

• Partner with Accounting and Treasury on payables timing, prepaids, and commitment schedules

Executive Reporting & Communication

• Deliver Cloud Services, Engineering, and Product insights for monthly business reviews, executive reviews, and board materials

• Translate complex technical and operational data into clear financial insight

• Provide actionable recommendations on cost efficiency, investment prioritization, and margin improvement

You

• Have a bachelor's degree in Finance, Accounting, Economics, or a related field

• Have 4+ years experience in FP&A, corporate finance, investment banking, or consulting, ideally with a focus on Cloud / AI infrastructure, SaaS, Data centers, Telecom, Hardware, or industrials

• Have direct experience partnering with Engineering or Product organizations on budget, roadmap, and investment decisions

• Possess extensive experience in financial modeling and analysis, with a deep expertise in constructing complex financial models and interpreting financial statements to drive strategic decision-making

• Have excellent analytical, strategic thinking, and decision-making skills

• Possess strong Excel skills and experience with financial software systems

• Have the ability to thrive in a fast-paced, high-growth environment, balancing multiple complex projects

• Have excellent written and verbal communication skills with the ability to present complex data clearly and concisely

• Are a team player with a positive attitude, strong work ethic, and a commitment to continuous improvement

• Are able to work in an ambiguous environment with very little direction

Nice to Have

• Prior experience in a startup or high-growth organization, demonstrating adaptability and flexibility to thrive in such environments

• Direct experience building or owning a cash flow forecast

• Experience with R&D capitalization, new product introduction, or product P&L ownership

• Working proficiency in SQL and comfort querying large data sets directly

• Familiarity with GPU compute, AI/ML workloads, or cloud infrastructure economics

Salary Range Information

The annual salary range for this position has been set 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 Lambda

• Founded in 2012, with 500+ employees, and growing fast

• Our investors notably include TWG Global, US Innovative Technology Fund (USIT), Andra Capital, SGW, Andrej Karpathy, ARK Invest, Fincadia Advisors, G Squared, In-Q-Tel (IQT), KHK & Partners, NVIDIA, Pegatron, Supermicro, Wistron, Wiwynn, Gradient Ventures, Mercato Partners, SVB, 1517, and Crescent Cove

• We have research papers accepted at top machine learning and graphics conferences, including NeurIPS, ICCV, SIGGRAPH, and TOG

• Our values are publicly available: https://lambda.ai/careers

• We offer generous cash & equity compensation

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

• Wellness and commuter stipends for select roles

• 401k Plan with 2% company match (USA employees)

• Flexible paid time off plan that we all actually use

Equal Opportunity Employer

Lambda is an Equal Opportunity employer. Applicants are considered without regard to race, color, religion, creed, national origin, age, sex, gender, marital status, sexual orientation and identity, genetic information, veteran status, citizenship, or any other factors prohibited by local, state, or federal law.