R&D Manager Wooden Furniture

www.rowico.se 

THE POSITION - R&D Manager Wooden Furniture

The R&D Manager takes the overall responsibility of product development and management of the company’s entire product assortment.

The company offers both own designs as well as products sourced from manufacturing partners, hence skills and experience within R&D and sourcing is crucial. The company’s success depends hugely on the its ability to ensure fulfillment of customers’ expectations and needs. The R&D manager must develop and maintain effective liaison both internally (also as part of the management group) and with external partners (suppliers & customers). The R&D team is expected to consist of at least 4 individuals based both at HQ and at the company’s subsidiaries.     

SPECIFIC RESPONSIBILITIES

Trend identification, research & analysis:
Identify trends at the early stages in the lifecycle
Close liaison with Key Account customers in order to understand their needs and expectations
Continual gap analysis of current collection
Perform performance analysis on particularly sales, margin & stock turn

Design & Development:
Effectively initiate product development projects based on research and analysis
Manage both internal as well as external designers
Carry though product development projects in close collaboration with 3rd party factories

Supplier collaboration, sourcing and negotiation:
Travel to suppliers to introduce new products and inspect proto types
Sourcing of new suppliers and new products
Negotiations with manufactures
Achieve target prices
Involved in supplier performance evaluation and preview of new suppliers

Management/Leadership and collaboration:
Hands-on involvement in the daily operation
Very close collaboration with technical- & marketing department
Manage a team of minimum 4 individuals
Further streamline the R&D working process and internal documents control
Visualize ideas and active projects directly to customers and internally
Lead NPD (new product development) process inside of the company and ensure follow up the actions are completed
Evaluate and control annual budget for R&D

 SPECIFIC REQUIREMENTS
Design education ideally combined with an academic degree
10 years’ experience in product development within furniture with at least 5 years of managerial experience
Experience within both in-house design and sourcing
Strong negotiation skills
Comfortable in working closely with manufacturing partners in both Asia and Europe
A very good nose for trends
Analytical skills
Strong knowledge of production process of Furniture (Wood)
Strong leadership skills
Can understand the company business model and add value to the business.
Deep understanding of the concept of market prices and the relation to manufacturing cost and total calculations
Excellent communication skill, inside/outside the company.

We look forward to your application “ R&D Manager Wooden Furniture” before the 26th of February. If you have further questions please contact Nilsson & Mossberger, Carin Mossberger +46 701-460 390 or Andreas Nilsson +46 701-460 391.