Buyer

About the Team

Our Robotics team is focused on unlocking general-purpose robotics and pushing towards AGI-level intelligence in dynamic, real-world settings. Working across the entire model stack, we integrate cutting-edge hardware and software to explore a broad range of robotic form factors. We strive to seamlessly blend high-level AI capabilities with the constraints of physical systems to improve peoples’ lives.

About the Role

We’re seeking a Buyer to support vendor execution and purchase order delivery for finished goods. In this role, you will manage day-to-day vendor interactions, drive purchase orders through procurement and finance processes, and support delivery tracking through handoff to logistics partners. You will work closely with engineering, operations, procurement, and finance teams to ensure purchasing decisions are executed accurately and on time, escalating risks and issues as needed.

This role sits at the execution layer of procurement. Sourcing strategy, supplier selection, and technical specifications are defined by internal stakeholders. This role ensures those decisions are translated into clean purchase orders, reliable vendor execution, and predictable delivery.

This role is based in the San Francisco Bay Area and requires in-person work five days per week.

In this role, you will:

• Support and manage relationships with assigned vendors supplying finished goods.

• Request, validate, and confirm vendor quotes based on defined commercial and technical requirements.

• Ensure incoterms, delivery responsibilities, and handoff points are clearly documented and aligned with vendors.

• Track vendor commitments, promise dates, and delivery status.

• Create purchase orders and drive them through procurement, legal, and finance approval workflows.

• Ensure purchase orders reflect accurate commercial and delivery terms, including pricing, quantities, ship-to locations, incoterms, promise dates, and payment terms.

• Release purchase orders to vendors and confirm acknowledgements and delivery schedules.

• Process purchase order changes related to quantity, timing, scope, or delivery terms as requirements evolve.

• Monitor delivery timelines, flag risks or delays, and engage vendors to clarify changes or issues.

• Escalate delivery, timing, or execution risks as needed and support issue resolution.

• Partner with engineering, operations, and planning teams to align demand and timing.

• Hand off approved purchase orders and vendor details to logistics coordinators for shipment execution.

• Maintain clear communication with stakeholders on status, risks, and changes.

• Ensure procurement and finance systems reflect accurate, up-to-date purchasing data.

You might thrive in this role if you:

• Have experience executing purchase orders and coordinating with external vendors.

• Understand incoterms and how they affect delivery responsibilities, risk transfer, and timing.

• Are comfortable navigating procurement, legal, and finance approval workflows.

• Can manage multiple open orders and vendor commitments with strong attention to detail.

• Communicate clearly across engineering, operations, procurement, and finance teams.

• Follow established processes while escalating risks and issues with good judgment.

Nice to have:

• Experience in hardware, manufacturing, robotics, or technical operations environments.

• Exposure to international suppliers, cross-border shipments, or complex delivery environments.

• Experience working in ERP or procurement systems.

About OpenAI

OpenAI is an AI research and deployment company dedicated to ensuring that general-purpose artificial intelligence benefits all of humanity. We push the boundaries of the capabilities of AI systems and seek to safely deploy them to the world through our products. AI is an extremely powerful tool that must be created with safety and human needs at its core, and to achieve our mission, we must encompass and value the many different perspectives, voices, and experiences that form the full spectrum of humanity.

We are an equal opportunity employer, and we do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, veteran status, disability, genetic information, or other applicable legally protected characteristic.

For additional information, please see OpenAI’s Affirmative Action and Equal Employment Opportunity Policy Statement.

Background checks for applicants will be administered in accordance with applicable law, and qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment consistent with those laws, including the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers, and the California Fair Chance Act, for US-based candidates. For unincorporated Los Angeles County workers: we reasonably believe that criminal history may have a direct, adverse and negative relationship with the following job duties, potentially resulting in the withdrawal of a conditional offer of employment: protect computer hardware entrusted to you from theft, loss or damage; return all computer hardware in your possession (including the data contained therein) upon termination of employment or end of assignment; and maintain the confidentiality of proprietary, confidential, and non-public information. In addition, job duties require access to secure and protected information technology systems and related data security obligations.

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