Senior Product Manager, API Products

We are looking for great people. We can be flexible on scope and seniority. If you believe you are qualified for any portion of this role, we strongly encourage you to apply.

Why does SPAN exist?

Founded by Tesla’s former head of energy, SPAN was founded because this is our Decade to Decarbonize. 

About 40% of greenhouse gas emissions are controlled by things we do in our households, decisions we make as individuals. Most of us feel powerless about confronting climate change, but the things in our basements, garages, and on our roofs directly influence the largest single slice of the problem (source). 

The answer is to electrify everything, which we do by:

1. Assisting the electric grid: The North American electric grid is the ‘world’s largest machine’. It is old, it is expensive to maintain and it was designed to transport power in one direction. And as we electrify everything, it is not equipped to handle an increase in volume of transport.
2. Upgrading our gas appliances and gasoline cars to electric. All the electricity in the world will still not power our gas dryers, furnaces, water heaters, stoves and cars. Electric versions of these appliances exist and they are safer, cheaper, cleaner, smaller and quieter.
3. Making more electricity at home. This increases the amount of clean electricity in circulation and does it without stressing the electric grid.

What is SPAN doing?

We envision a future where our homes are

• Self-reliant: They make their own energy and decide when to use that energy. They warn you of outages, prepare themselves, and adapt energy use to endure even the most severe outages.
• All-electric: Our homes cannot be self-reliant until they are all-electric. SPAN removes constraints that exist with your existing power service, allowing households to upgrade their gasoline cars and gas appliances to their electric superiors.
• Looking out for us: They tell you if something bad has happened, is happening or will happen to your most-expensive appliances
• A model citizen of the grid: They assist the grid at times of need, with little inconvenience to you.

None of this is possible without a modern-day electric panel. So we started by completely reinventing this hundred year-old appliance.

If you want to learn more, watch (span.io/decadetodecarbonize) or read (span.io/plan) about the progress we have made, the products and services we have announced and how our partners are supporting us on our mission.

Why you should consider this role

SPAN is a critical node in a distributed energy ecosystem rich with opportunity. Our ecosystem partners include power utilities, solar installers, property developers, home improvement businesses and manufacturers of smart home devices, appliances and electric vehicles.

SPAN’s mission to electrify everything requires integration of control functionality into ecosystem platforms, tools and experiences. We will succeed if we enable our ecosystem to differentiate, simplify and scale their own offerings.

For this we are building the ‘internet of electricity’, which you can think of as a suite of cloud and local APIs, webhooks and services that requires device management, bi-directional communication and authenticated controls that function reliably for 3rd parties while maintaining harmony with the needs of the household. We believe that a general purpose platform of composable building blocks will accelerate the delivery of these products.

In this role you will champion the voice of various ecosystem partners to deliver a platform that can rapidly accelerate SPAN’s mission impact.

Responsibilities

1. Discovery: Manage non-linear and rapid discovery cycles across disparate integration opportunities to gain a solid understanding of partnership needs, end-user needs, how partners systems work and ultimately what value SPAN can deliver.
2. Design: Build up to solutions with an eye on reusability and speed. Facilitate good decision-making through effective articulation of approaches and trade offs to business and technical teams.
3. Delivery: Be accountable for execution in collaboration with other product, systems engineering and revenue teams, as well as with partner development teams. Deliver the API continuously, rather than all-at-once.
4. Go To Market: Champion the rollout of your products. Obsess over supporting external teams through initial integration and ongoing usage.
5. Iteration: Ensure what we launch, lands. Measure product usage and performance, collect qualitative feedback and derive actionable insights to improve existing capability and prioritize/design new capability.

Experience we are looking for

• Foundational understanding of modern API application architecture that enables integration into ecosystems comprising disparate business models. 
• 5+ years of experience building proprietary and standards-based APIs, with a deep understanding of API calls, gateway design, documentation and development.
• Foundational understanding of data privacy, enterprise security and compliance requirements.
• Ability to crystallize abstract and vague concepts into concise tactical plans.
• Familiarity with mocking tools that allow for early and ongoing assessment of API development.
• A huge plus
• Familiarity with popular DER control standards (OpenADR, IEEE 2030.5)
• Familiarity with local networking
• Master’s degree in Computer Science or equivalent 

Life at SPAN

SPAN embraces diversity and equal opportunity in a serious way. We are committed to building a team that represents a variety of backgrounds, perspectives, and skills. 

Headquartered in San Francisco’s vibrant SoMa neighborhood, we are an eclectic group of creative thinkers who value open communication, teamwork, and a ‘make it happen’ approach to addressing complex challenges. 

Our CEO, Arch Rao⁠—former head of the Tesla Powerwall team⁠—fosters an energetic and collaborative environment, with a strong emphasis on maintaining work-life-balance across the organization.

We’re hiring talented individuals who are driven by success and are passionate about shaping the future of renewable energy. If that sounds like you, we’d love for you to consider joining the rapidly growing team at SPAN.

The Perks:

⚡ Competitive compensation + equity grants at a well-funded, venture-backed company

⚡ Comprehensive benefits (including medical; dental, vision, life and disability insurance)

⚡ Comfortable, sunny office space located near BART and Caltrain public transit

⚡ Strong focus on teambuilding and company culture (events, meet-ups, clubs)

⚡ Flexible hours and unlimited PTO

Our Mission & Values:

At SPAN, we believe that powering your home with clean energy should be a simple and delightful experience that is at its essence human-centered and technology-forward.

Our core values include:

• Making home energy more accessible, intuitive, and convenient.
• Enabling homes and vehicles to be powered by the sun.
• Building resilient homes with reliable power.
• All-electric everything.
• A more flexible & distributed grid.

Interested in joining our team? Submit an application today and we’ll be in touch with next steps!