Senior IT lead - S&OP

About SKF

SKF is the world leading supplier of products and solutions in the bearing business including technical support, maintenance services, condition monitoring and training.

The inherent skills and competence of our around 40,000 employees help us to fulfill our objective of creating more intelligent, sustainable and innovative customer solutions. SKF is a truly global company with presence in more than 130 countries, serving an extensive range of industries and customers worldwide. SKF started its operations in India in 1923.

SKF has hands-on experience in over 40 industries with knowledge and a vast product portfolio across the SKF technology platforms: bearings and units, seals, lubrication systems, condition monitoring equipment, and services.

We operate in four regions – the Americas, Europe, Middle East & Africa, India & Southeast Asia and China & Northeast Asia – to serve customers with speed and responsiveness.

SKF has been in India since more than 100 years and has a pan India footprint consisting of 6 manufacturing facilities, 12 offices, a supplier network of over 300 distributors and an employee base of more than 2600 dedicated professionals.

To know more, please visit: www.skf.com/in

SKF Purpose Statement

Together, we re-imagine rotation for a better tomorrow.

By creating intelligent and clean solutions for people and the planet

JOB DESCRIPTION

Job title: Senior IT Lead S&OP

Reports To: Aerospace BU IT and Digitalization Manager

Role Type: Individual Contributor

Location: Bangalore

Position Overview

We are seeking a high-caliber Senior IT Lead for Sales & Operations Planning (S&OP) who combines enterprise IT architecture capability with deep functional manufacturing expertise. S&OP in aerospace manufacturing is a high-stakes, data-intensive process. Without a dedicated technology leader who understands how shop-floor realities translate into data models, planning programs routinely stall, and the organization operates on disconnected spreadsheets rather than a single version of the truth.

In this role, you will be the single accountable owner for our S&OP technology ecosystem. Your immediate focus will be architecting and delivering internal, interim S&OP data and planning solution built on modern data infrastructure. Long-term, you will lead our enterprise migration to SAP Integrated Business Planning (IBP). Critically, you will serve as a bridge between manufacturing operations and digital systems—translating complex production constraints like machine bottlenecking, multi-level Bills of Materials (BOMs), and long-horizon demand patterns into a seamless digital planning backbone.

This is a build-from-the-ground-up opportunity. You will shape how our business unit plans, and your work will directly influence executive decision-making at the monthly S&OP cycle.

Why This Role Exists

• • Our business unit is building its S&OP process from the ground up. We need a dedicated technology owner who can architect the data foundation, not bolt tools onto broken processes.
  • The broader Data & Analytics team is executing an advanced AI and analytics roadmap. Without a ring-fenced S&OP technology lead, reactive planning firefighting will consume bandwidth that must be protected for strategic initiatives.
  • Our eventual migration to SAP IBP requires that the interim solution be built with forward-compatible data schemas and master data governance—this demands intentional architecture from day one.
  • S&OP success in aerospace manufacturing depends on someone who can credibly speak both the language of the shop floor (routers, work centers, cycle times) and the language of enterprise data architecture (data models, integration patterns, MDM).

Key Responsibilities:

1. S&OP Data Architecture & Manufacturing Integration

• • Capacity & Bottleneck Modeling: Architect data flows that accurately capture shop-floor realities, including work center capacities, bottleneck operations, machine efficiencies, and demonstrated run rates vs. theoretical standards.
  • Production Data Integration: Ensure data models deeply integrate critical manufacturing primitives: complex multi-level Bills of Materials (BOMs), operational routers, step-by-step cycle times, lead times, and component availability logic.
  • Aerospace Demand Modeling: Build and tune demand-side data feeds to handle low-volume/high-mix complexities, long-horizon backlogs (often 12–36+ months), and strict customer compliance and traceability requirements.
  • Master Data Governance: Establish and enforce master data standards for items, work centers, BOMs, and routers to ensure data quality across the planning ecosystem.

2. Technical Strategy & Solution Delivery

• • End-to-End Ownership: Serve as the single point of accountability for S&OP systems delivery—ensuring data availability, reconciliation, and integration across demand, supply, finance, and operations.
  • Interim Solution Design: Design and deploy the internal interim S&OP solution using modern data architecture (e.g., Snowflake, Power BI, Streamlit, or equivalent). Ensure data schemas and governance are structurally aligned to accelerate future SAP IBP migration.
  • SAP IBP Roadmap Ownership: Own the technical roadmap for SAP IBP adoption, including requirements definition, vendor/SI partner interaction, data migration planning, and integration architecture with the core ERP backend.
  • System Integration: Oversee technical integration between core ERP systems (SAP S4/HANA, Infor M3, Infor XA etc, master data, inventory, open orders), advanced scheduling systems, and the S&OP planning layer.

3. Organizational Enablement & Change Management

• • Cross-Functional Translation: Facilitate technical alignment across Operations, Finance, Supply Chain, and Sales—ensuring all functions operate from a single, validated data set through each phase of the S&OP cycle.
  • Process-Technology Alignment: Work closely with the S&OP process owner to ensure technology design directly supports the 5-step S&OP cadence (Data Gathering, Demand Review, Supply Review, Pre-S&OP, Executive S&OP).
  • Training & Adoption: Develop training materials, user documentation, and hands-on enablement programs to drive adoption of new S&OP tools across planning, operations, and finance teams.
  • Bandwidth Protection: Serve as the primary technical triage point for S&OP system issues, ring-fencing the broader Data & Analytics team so they can remain focused on the core AI and advanced analytics roadmap.

4. Vendor & Partner Management

• • SI/Vendor Governance: Manage relationships with systems integration partners, software vendors, and consultants involved in S&OP solution delivery and future SAP IBP implementation.
  • Build vs. Buy Evaluation: Continuously evaluate build-vs-buy decisions for planning capabilities, balancing speed-to-value with long-term architectural sustainability.

Candidate’s Profile:

• • Experience: 8+ years in IT/Digitalization roles, with 3+ years explicitly focused on supply chain planning, S&OP, or Integrated Business Planning technology.
  • ERP & Planning Systems: Hands-on experience with SAP IBP modules (Demand, Supply & Response, or S&OP) or equivalent enterprise planning platforms. Experience integrating planning systems with foundational ERP backends (SAP S/4HANA, Infor M3, XA, or equivalent tier-1 manufacturing ERPs).
  • Data Foundations: Strong proficiency in SQL, data warehousing concepts, and master data management (MDM). Experience working with cloud data platforms (e.g., Snowflake) is a plus.
  • Visualization & Prototyping: Experience building reporting layers and planning dashboards using tools like Power BI, Streamlit, or equivalent.

Functional Manufacturing Expertise

• • Deep Shop-Floor Literacy: Strong working knowledge of manufacturing execution concepts—how a router functions, how work center bottlenecks impact rough-cut capacity planning (RCCP), how component availability impacts multi-level BOM explosion, and how scheduling interacts with finite capacity.
  • S&OP Frameworks: Thorough understanding of the S&OP process cycle and how data must step up through each phase—from granular transactional data to aggregated executive planning views.
  • Industry Context: Experience in industrial manufacturing. Familiarity with aerospace sector dynamics (demand volatility, long lead-time components, strict traceability and compliance requirements) is highly preferred.

Preferred (Differentiators)

• • Experience leading or participating in a full SAP IBP implementation lifecycle (not just configuration).
  • Experience with ITAR-regulated or defense manufacturing environments and associated data handling requirements.
  • Exposure to CMMC, AS9100, or equivalent aerospace quality/compliance frameworks from an IT systems perspective.
  • Familiarity with Infor M3, Infor XA, SAP S4/HANA ERP and its integration patterns.
  • Understanding of AI/ML applications in demand sensing, supply planning, or inventory optimization.
  • Experience with agile delivery methods for enterprise planning projects.