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Technical Product Manager

Graphcore·Bristol·Hybrid·Posted today

Graphcore is a Bristol-based AI semiconductor company building Intelligence Processing Units, with a UK engineering footprint focused on silicon, software, and post-silicon validation. They're hiring a Technical Product Manager based in Bristol (hybrid). This product role sits within the UK's semiconductor sector.

About Graphcore 

At Graphcore, we’re building the future of AI compute.

We’re a team of semiconductor, software and AI experts, with deep experience in creating the complete AI compute stack - from silicon and software to infrastructure at datacenter scale.

As part of the SoftBank Group, backed by significant long-term investment, we are delivering key technology into the fast-growing SoftBank AI ecosystem.

To meet the vast and exciting AI opportunity, Graphcore is expanding its teams around the world.

We are bringing together the brightest minds to solve the toughest problems, in a place where everyone has the opportunity to make an impact on the company, our products and the future of artificial intelligence.

 

Job Summary   

We are looking for a Product Manager to define and drive the product vision, roadmap, and feature delivery across a complex, multi-team software organisation. You will operate at the intersection of customer value, business strategy, and engineering execution—owning the “what” and “why” of the product while working closely with Product Owners, Engineering, Architecture, and Programme leadership to ensure successful delivery. 

 

The Team 

The software teams this role supports operate from bare metal silicon all the way to the top of the Machine learning tools stack. Our organisation is structured around component-based engineering teams within the engineering function, and you will play a key role in aligning these teams through a coherent product strategy, coordinated planning, and clear prioritisation. You will be accountable for ensuring that product direction translates into actionable work across teams, enabling both short-term delivery and long-term strategic planning. 

 

Responsibilities and Duties 

Product strategy and vision:

  • Define and own the strategy for the Software area you represent, aligning it with the wider business and product strategy. 
  • Act as the voice of the customer(s)/stakeholder(s) for the area you represent, balancing business priorities, and technical constraints. 
  • Communicate product strategy clearly to engineering teams, stakeholders, and leadership. 

Feature planning and backlog ownership:

  • Own the feature backlog for the Software area you represent, ensuring features are well-defined, prioritised, and aligned to outcomes. 
  • Build and evolve the backlog to clearly reflect product strategy and direction. 
  • Drive creation and maintenance of the long-term planning views, taking the backlog data to show projected dates and resource needs. 
  • Collaborate with Product Owners to refine and break down features into component-level work. 
  • Ensure clear traceability from product goals → features → team backlogs.
  • Make trade-off decisions on scope, sequencing, and priorities. 

Program Increment (PI) planning and coordination:

  • Coordinate PI planning preparation and ceremonies, working with Product Owners, Programme Management, and Agile leadership. 
  • Ensure features are sufficiently refined and ready ahead of planning events.
  • Align priorities and scope across component teams to enable effective planning. 
  • Support the definition of clear objectives and outcomes for each planning increment. 

Cross-team coordination and alignment:

  • Coordinate multiple Product Owners to ensure alignment across component teams.
  • Work closely with Engineering, Architecture, and Programme roles to manage dependencies and sequencing. 
  • Ensure product delivery remains coherent across teams contributing to the same features.

Stakeholder engagement:

  • Act as the primary interface between business stakeholders and engineering.
  • Communicate roadmap progress, risks, and changes to stakeholders and customers. 

Feedback and continuous improvement: 

  • Gather feedback from teams on feasibility, risks, and delivery challenges.
  • Use insights from delivery (metrics, demos, retrospectives) to refine roadmap and priorities. 
  • Continuously improve product planning and backlog practices across teams.

 

Candidate Profile 

Essential:  

Product leadership and ownership:

  • Proven experience owning product vision and roadmap in a complex software environment.
  • Strong ability to make prioritisation and trade-off decisions with incomplete information.
  • Comfortable being both accountable and hands-on in shaping product direction.

 Collaboration and influence:

  • Experience working across multiple engineering teams and stakeholders.
  • Ability to align teams without direct authority.
  • Strong communication skills across technical and non-technical audiences.

Delivery and planning understanding:

  • Solid understanding of agile development practices, including backlog management, sprint planning, and PI planning.
  • Experience coordinating planning at scale across multiple teams.
  • Ability to connect long-term strategy with short-term delivery realities.

Customer and value focus: 

  • Strong communicator with the ability to translate needs into actionable product direction.
  • Focus on outcomes over output, with an understanding of how to measure value delivery. 

Technical awareness:

  • Comfortable working with engineering teams and understanding technical trade-offs.
  • Ability to engage in discussions on architecture, feasibility, and implementation constraints. 

 

Desirable:

  • Degree in a relevant field such as Computer Science, Engineering or a related discipline.
  • Certified Product Owner / Product Manager (e.g. Scrum.org PSPO, Pragmatic Institute, SAFe POPM) 
  • Experience working in hardware/software integrated environments.
  • Familiarity with high-performance computing, AI/ML systems, or similar domains.

 

Benefits

In addition to a competitive salary, Graphcore offers flexible working, a generous annual leave policy, private medical insurance and health cash plan, a dental plan, pension (matched up to 5%), life assurance and income protection. We have a generous parental leave policy and an employee assistance programme (which includes health, mental wellbeing, and bereavement support). We offer a range of healthy food and snacks at our central Bristol office and have our own barista bar! We welcome people of different backgrounds and experiences; we’re committed to building an inclusive work environment that makes Graphcore a great home for everyone. We offer an equal opportunity process and understand that there are visible and invisible differences in all of us. We can provide a flexible approach to interview and encourage you to chat to us if you require any reasonable adjustments.

Applicants for this position must hold the right to work in the UK. Unfortunately at this time, we are unable to provide visa sponsorship or support for visa applications.

 

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About Graphcore

Graphcore is a Bristol-based AI semiconductor company founded in 2016 by serial semiconductor entrepreneurs Nigel Toon and Simon Knowles. Toon previously led XMOS and Picochip, while Knowles co-founded Element14 (acquired by Broadcom) and Icera (acquired by NVIDIA for $435M). The company developed Intelligence Processing Units (IPUs), novel AI accelerators designed from the ground up for machine learning workloads, alongside the proprietary Poplar graph programming framework. Graphcore raised $767M in total funding, reaching a $2.77B valuation, with backing from Sequoia Capital, Atomico, Amadeus, Microsoft, and others. In July 2024, SoftBank Group acquired Graphcore for approximately $500M to $600M. The company continues to operate from Bristol with plans to expand its UK headcount to 750.

Stage: AcquiredBristol
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