Group Product Manager - Quantum Applications, Europe

We are looking for a highly capable and independent Product Manager to help define the future of applications in this new quantum era. As a member of the product organization, you’ll be part of a cross-functional team whose mission is to lead IonQ on its journey to build the world’s best quantum computing solutions to solve the world’s most complex problems. 

Product Management in quantum computing is no different from any other field, with the exciting difference that you get to be among the first people in history ever to build it. Quantum computers and quantum applications rely on cutting-edge technologies across diverse engineering disciplines, including Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, data analysis, and a hybrid execution model that relies on both quantum computers and classical computing resources such as High-Performance Computing. Having interest and experience in these fields will serve you well at IonQ, but we don’t expect you to be an expert in any of them. 

You mostly need to demonstrate intellectual curiosity, work well with highly specialized experts, and manage a coherent point of view of what’s important to our end-users and how we might build a thriving applications business. This also includes conducting market analysis, revenue opportunity estimations, channel analysis, and overall business planning. This is a unique opportunity to significantly impact IonQ’s market success and drive the broader quantum computing industry as it transitions from a vision into reality.

Responsibilities:

• Immerse yourself in IonQ’s unique flavor of quantum computing (hardware and software), its advantages, and overall considerations.
• Establish a solid understanding of the global quantum applications ecosystem across a broad range of industries and identify its customer base, needs, and priorities.
• Identify quantum applications in specific industries (e.g., pharma, chemicals, logistics etc)  and provide the team and customers with the long-term perspective of the potential of quantum applications, taking into account industry-specific computational workflows
• Lead customer discovery workshops with customers to open up new application opportunities in e.g., pharma, chemicals, logistics etc.
• Evaluate the attractiveness of quantum applications by providing an objective business analysis of each opportunity (size of market, P&L analysis, channels) and validating assumptions through expert interviews in industry and academia
• Synthesize near-term and long-term feasibility levels of identified applications together with quantum applications engineering experts
• Collaborate with customers and the quantum applications engineering teams to build customer-specific application roadmap for lead customers in each industry that matches with technology progression expectations and the customer’s business strategy. 
• For each application on the roadmap, define and document its requirements with clarity in Product Requirements Documents.
• Directly collaborate with customers/partners and internal engineering teams to navigate implementation challenges and advocate for solutions that delight in team discussions.
• Collaborate with the sales, marketing and other business teams to understand the expressed needs of IonQ's (future) customers regarding quantum applications and algorithms and to set pricing, review business models/positioning, and competition.

You’d be a good fit if you... 

• Minimum of 8 of professional experience or an equivalent combination of education and experience
• Have experience in computing solutions for various industries, such as chemistry, pharmaceuticals, logistics, automotive.
• Have significant experience managing complex market analysis projects (including industry landscaping) with significant ambiguity and partial information.
• Are capable of establishing fruitful relationships with existing and future customers, leading to the type of insights required for developing solutions for their current and future needs.
• Are comfortable dealing with advanced technologies, even if you have clear knowledge gaps, while collaborating with a broad range of engineering experts and scientists to achieve product goals.
• Are capable of organizing requirements and priorities despite ambiguity - drive results, and form plans for validating product ideas that offer clarity.
• Enjoy and have practice collaborating with multiple business, research, and engineering teams to drive concrete results.

You’d be a great fit if you...

• Have a technical degree (e.g., physics, engineering, chemistry, pharmaceutical, biology, computational science or related fields) 
• Have a basic experience and/or understanding of quantum computing hardware and/or software (again, not a must).
• Have an MBA degree with real-world experience putting your business education into practice, especially in coming up with business analysis for the purpose of investment (estimating ROI with partial information).
• Have worked in or closely with computational scientists in the pharmaceutical, chemical or logistics/automotive industries and have a strong understanding of the computational tools and workflows used in these industries.
• Have practical or theoretical experience with diverse computer science techniques and technologies such as Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Vision, High Performance Computing, optimization algorithms, etc.
• Have experience being part of an entrepreneurial team, building a new category and businesses from scratch, and making products/services successful in their marketplace.
• Have experience running market sizing exercises, for example in a platform-focused product management role, management consulting, or in a venture capital role.
• Have contributed to the identification and segmentation of markets for novel advanced technology where the market is nascent, and data is limited.
• Have strong foundational knowledge about science in general, enough to converse and engage with scientists on a broad range of topics.

Location: We are actively building out teams in Europe in general and Gothenburg, Sweden in specific, and will want to locate this position in Sweden. However, for the right candidate, this position can also be remote within Europe, with frequent travel to Sweden (up to 30%). 
Travel: Up to 30%
Job ID:  1043