Co-Founder (COO) — Business & Operations Lead (m/f/d) - Dortmund

We’re building a deep-tech startup at the intersection of Federated Learning, Condition Monitoring and Industrial IoT.

Machines rarely fail, but when they do, it’s expensive. Classic preventive maintenance is blunt, and data sharing to the cloud is often blocked by privacy, bandwidth, and IT constraints. At NexuFed, we’re building privacy-preserving industrial AI for machine and valve manufacturers by fixing this with a combination of

• Edge Condition Monitoring (audio, vibration, etc.)
• Federated Learning so raw data never leaves the factory
• Lifelong learning & personalization per machine with few labels

The team

We’re two technical founders (PhD & ML researchers) and are now looking for our business co-pilot to build a profitable company.

René Glitza (CEO & CTO) owns the technical vision and product development, combining federated learning research with hands-on experience in ML infrastructure and product/project leadership for embedded industrial systems.

Luca Becker (CAIO) drives AI R&D, specializing in distributed and privacy-preserving machine learning, large-scale multi-modal systems, and decentralized learning architectures.

Your role

As Co-Founder & COO you own everything commercial & operational:

• Shape go-to-market, pricing & business model (SaaS + Edge devices + platform)
• Drive business development & sales with machine builders and industrial partners
• Build our financial plan & funding story (EXIST, grants, investors)
• Set up lean operations & processes so we can scale efficiently

Stage & commitment

We’re early—and transparent:

• 2025–2027: Research & PoC phase alongside our PhDs
• From 2028 (EXIST / spin-off planned): company formation, pilots, ramp-up

What this means for you:

• Until ~2028: part-time, no salary, early commitment advantage, building the foundation together
• From EXIST/spin-off onwards: full-time co-founder role with competitive TV-L–oriented salary