Head of Finance | VC Backed Energy Tech Company | London, Hybrid

Head of Finance | VC Backed Energy Tech Company | London, Hybrid

Harmonic is delighted to be retained by a VC-backed technology business in the energy sector.

Its customers are the industrial and commercial companies for whom power is no longer just a procurement line but a board-level cost and often the biggest brake on their growth.

AI, electrification and the reindustrialisation of the West are all pulling on the same grid at once, and the market that serves large energy users was never built for it: slow, opaque, heavily intermediated and short on trust.

This business is rebuilding it as a technology company, not an energy one.

The growth backs up the ambition.

Revenue is on track to grow more than twentyfold this year and another tenfold in 2027, taking it from zero to £100m in two years, and it has taken remarkably little capital to get there: the last round was pre-empted and oversubscribed, raised from a position of not needing it.

You'll work alongside an exceptional founding team, the CEO has done this before, scaling a business from a few dozen people to several thousand and several hundred million in revenue, and is now doing it again in a sector he believes has hit exactly the right moment.

This is an ideal opportunity for someone who is looking to work within a lean, high-performance, AI native start-up that are not only massively revenue generating but also mission led.

The Role

This is the first finance hire, reporting to the CEO and co-founder, and it holds the commercial engine of the business.

Tens of millions of pounds already move across a long chain of customers, suppliers, intermediaries and market counterparties, heading into the hundreds of millions within a year, and you would be the only person who can see the whole cash picture.

You build it from scratch: the rolling forecast, the collections and payments engine, the close and the reporting the founders actually run on, with automation and AI at the centre rather than headcount.

There is no function to inherit and no legacy to defend, so you set the standard from day one and stay close to the detail until the systems you put in take it off your desk.

A trading desk and risk function own the hedging, so your job is to make sure their exposure shows up in the cash position, not to take those calls yourself.

For the right person the scope keeps opening up, with a realistic path to Finance Director in around eighteen months and the equity story, capital structure and funding that come with it.

Key Responsibilities

• Build the finance systems stack from scratch with AI and automation at its core, alongside engineering and ops, so the function scales without headcount scaling with it.
• Own cash: a rolling forecast, long-term runway visibility, working capital, banking and payment operations, and the collateral and margin requirements that come with trading counterparties.
• Own the money flows across the full counterparty chain, from what comes in from customers through to what goes out to suppliers, intermediaries and market counterparties, and the payment terms that govern both sides.
• Design the revenue collection and payment engine: credit control policy, invoicing accuracy, terms, aged debtor reporting and escalation, built to scale and automated so it largely runs itself.
• FP&A duties including lead budgeting, reforecasting and planning directly with the founders, grounded in the unit economics and the real drivers of the business.
• Design and own month-end close and get the business to a faster, tighter reporting rhythm, producing the management accounts and the board and investor pack.
• Partner with the trading desk so that market exposure, cashflow and P&L forecasts line up, and own customer credit risk end to end.
• Own broker and third-party commission accounting: calculate, accrue and reconcile against statements, and resolve discrepancies fast.
• Own statutory accounts, audit, payroll and tax compliance, and build proportionate internal controls: payment approvals, delegation of authority, segregation of duties.
• Experience inside a start-up or high-growth business.

This is not an environment with the structure to absorb someone learning how a young company works at the same time as learning the sector.

• Experience of complex, multi-party operational businesses rather than pure Saa S.

Energy or commodities is the obvious home, but marketplaces, two-sided partnership models, consumer fintech built on partnership or credit structures, and healthcare and health-tech all carry comparable complexity.

• Direct experience of complex cashflow environments: many counterparties, differing payment terms and timelines, and multiple cost and revenue streams.
• A track record of building or significantly improving finance processes, controls and systems, rather than running a machine somebody else built.
• Exceptional numerical ability, diligence and thoroughness.
• A first-principles problem solver who can take a problem, break it down logically, reach a clear conclusion and explain it simply.
• Open to building the function a new way rather than reinstalling the one you have run before.
• Qualified accountant (ACA / ACCA / CIMA or equivalent).
• Experience in an energy business, trading house, commodities business or fintech.
• Experience as an early finance hire building a function from scratch.
• Already AI-native in how you work, using AI and automation in your finance work today.
• Salary
• Candidate dependent, benchmarked at £100,000 to £150,000 + equity
• Location

London, office first culture with ideally four days a week in the office with the founders and team, plus ten remote-working days a year

Start Date

ASAP. The client would ideally have someone in seat before the end of the year, with flexibility for the ideal candidate.

At Harmonic, we are dedicated to fostering an inclusive and equitable workplace.

We actively welcome applications from individuals of all backgrounds and assure you that every candidate will be thoughtfully considered for the roles we represent, without regard to race, religion, gender expression, disability, or sexual orientation.

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