Global Buyer & Planner

About Vital Lyfe

At Vital Lyfe, we are on a mission to solve global water scarcity by creating innovative desalination systems. This is an opportunity to join a passionate, multidisciplinary team tackling one of the world’s most critical challenges, water.

We are seeking a proactive and detail-oriented Buyer/Planner to manage sourcing, planning, and procurement across new product introductions and ongoing production. This role is central to ensuring continuity of supply, optimizing cost, quality, and delivery, and driving collaboration across engineering, supply chain, and production teams. The ideal candidate combines technical acumen with strong supplier management and planning expertise.

- Develop and execute inventory strategies that align with business and production goals, tracking metrics and results end-to-end.

- Maintain accurate configurations (BOMs), lead times, and inventory levels (including spares) to prevent production shortages.

- Place and manage purchase orders (MRP-driven and ad-hoc), resolving discrepancies and invoice issues as needed.

- Support logistics optimization, redistribution policies for assigned parts.

Supplier Management & Sourcing

- Build and maintain a robust supply base (domestic and international), ensuring capability, capacity, and financial health.

- Negotiate contracts, RFIs, RFPs, and RFQs, ensuring continuity of supply and competitive costs.

- Partner with suppliers to develop cost management strategies, drive performance improvements, and mitigate sole/single-source risks.

- Conduct supplier visits and assessments to validate equipment, technical expertise, and quality systems.

Cross-Functional Collaboration

- Act as the primary interface between engineering, production, supply chain, and reliability teams for sourcing and planning decisions.

- Support design-for-manufacturability reviews, trade studies, and should-cost modeling with engineering and supplier quality teams.

- Lead cross-functional initiatives to optimize sourcing strategies, improve supplier performance, and adopt low-cost/low-risk parts.

- Provide status updates to leadership and proactively communicate critical supply issues.

Risk & Performance Management

- Perform risk analysis incorporating historical supplier performance, demand/supply balance, and lead time analysis.

- Drive value engineering initiatives to improve part quality and reduce costs.

- Monitor global industry trends and supplier technology roadmaps, identifying and mitigating potential supply chain risks.

- Manage costs to align with program budgets and present value propositions and cost strategies to executives.

What We're Looking For

- Bachelor’s degree in Supply Chain, Business, Engineering, or related field (or equivalent experience).

- Proven experience in procurement, planning, and supplier management in a production/manufacturing environment.

- Strong negotiation, contract management, and cost analysis skills.

- Familiarity with BOM management, MRP systems, and supply chain risk assessment.

- Excellent cross-functional communication and project management skills.

- Ability to travel for supplier visits and assessments.

Why Join Vital Lyfe?

- Work on high-impact problems with global relevance

- Help scale breakthrough technology in water security and climate resilience

- Early ownership in a high-growth, engineering-led startup

- Join a tight-knit, mission-driven team in a fast-paced environment

- Build long-term career equity as we grow