Role Overview 

Astera Labs is seeking a dynamic HR Director to lead our EMEA human resources team, overseeing operations across our Israel Design Centers in Haifa and Tel Aviv, as well as our R&D center in Aachen, Germany. This is a critical leadership role that will shape the people strategy for our rapidly expanding EMEA presence as we continue to scale our world-class engineering teams building the connectivity solutions powering the AI revolution. 

As HR Director, you will operate as a true business leader who happens to specialize in people strategy—not a support function, but a driver of business outcomes. You will partner with EMEA site leadership to accelerate product development timelines, improve engineering productivity, and build the organizational capabilities required to win in the AI infrastructure market. Equally critical, you will serve as the connective tissue between EMEA and our global corporate teams, ensuring seamless alignment on programs, policies, and priorities while representing EMEA needs in global discussions. This role demands a commercially-minded leader who connects every HR initiative to measurable business impact, whether that's reducing time-to-hire for critical roles, improving retention of top performers, or building leadership bench strength to support our expansion. You will build and scale a high-performing HR team while partnering closely with our global HR function to deliver results. 

Key Responsibilities 

Business Partnership & Strategic Impact 

• Drive EMEA people strategy that directly accelerates business outcomes including product delivery, engineering velocity, and market expansion 

• Operate as a member of the EMEA leadership team, contributing to business decisions beyond traditional HR scope 

• Translate business challenges into people solutions—identify where talent, organizational design, or capability gaps are limiting growth and take action 

• Establish and track HR metrics tied to business performance, holding the function accountable for measurable results 

Global Alignment & Collaboration 

• Partner closely with global corporate teams including HR, Finance, Legal, and IT to ensure EMEA alignment on company-wide initiatives and programs 

• Serve as the primary HR liaison between EMEA sites and headquarters, advocating for regional needs while maintaining global consistency 

• Collaborate on the design and rollout of global HR programs, adapting implementation for local markets while preserving intent 

• Build strong cross-functional relationships across geographies to enable effective decision-making and execution 

Talent Strategy & Competitive Advantage 

• Build a world-class semiconductor talent pipeline that gives Astera Labs a competitive edge in EMEA markets 

• Partner with engineering leadership to forecast talent needs and proactively address skill gaps before they impact delivery 

• Design compensation and retention strategies that protect critical talent and reduce regrettable attrition 

• Drive workforce planning that aligns headcount investments with product roadmap priorities 

Team Building & Scaling 

• Build, develop, and lead a high-performing HR team across Israel and Germany oriented around delivering business results 

• Effectively manage and develop remote teams across international borders, fostering collaboration and accountability across multiple sites 

• Drive scalable HR processes and infrastructure to support rapid growth without sacrificing speed or quality 

• Create clear accountability and performance expectations within the HR function 

HR Operations & Compliance 

• Ensure execution excellence in HR operations including employee relations, compensation, benefits, and performance management across EMEA 

• Maintain compliance with local labor laws and regulations in Israel and Germany 

• Continuously improve operational efficiency to free up capacity for strategic priorities 

Culture & Performance 

• Champion a high-performance culture that attracts ambitious talent and drives accountability 

• Implement initiatives that improve employee engagement and productivity, not engagement for its own sake 

• Foster an environment where top performers thrive and underperformance is addressed swiftly 

Basic Qualifications 

• Bachelor's degree in Human Resources, Business Administration, or related field 

• 10+ years of progressive HR experience with significant time in HR leadership roles 

• 3+ years of experience managing and developing HR teams 

• Demonstrated ability to manage remote teams across international borders and multiple time zones 

• Experience in the semiconductor or high-tech hardware industry 

• Strong knowledge of Israel labor law and HR practices; familiarity with German employment regulations 

• Proven track record of scaling HR functions in high-growth environments 

• Demonstrated business acumen with a history of tying HR initiatives to measurable business outcomes 

Preferred Qualifications 

• Master's degree in Human Resources, MBA, or related advanced degree 

• Experience supporting engineering-heavy organizations in fast-paced, product-driven companies 

• Multi-country HR management experience across EMEA 

• Experience partnering with US-headquartered companies and navigating global/regional dynamics 

• Hebrew language fluency; German language skills a plus 

• Experience with M&A integration or establishing new site operations 

• HR certification (SHRM-SCP, CIPD, or equivalent) 

Lightricks is an AI-first company creating next-generation content creation technology for businesses, enterprises, and studios with a mission to bridge the gap between imagination and creation. At our core is LTX-2, an open-source generative video model, built to deliver expressive, high-fidelity video at unmatched speed. It powers both our own products and a growing ecosystem of partners through API integration.

The company is also known globally for pioneering consumer creativity through products like Facetune, one of the world’s most recognized creative brands, which helped introduce AI-powered visual expression to hundreds of millions of users worldwide. We combine deep research, user-first design, and end-to-end execution from concept to final render, to bring the future of expression to all.

Why Join Us

We’re here to push the boundaries of what’s possible with AI and video - not for the buzz, but for the craft, the challenge, and the chance to make something genuinely new.

We believe in an environment where people are encouraged to think, create and explore. Real impact happens when people are empowered to experiment, evolve, and elevate together.

At Lightricks, every breakthrough starts with great people and a collaborative mindset. If you're looking for a place that combines deep tech, creative energy, and zero buzzword culture, you might be in the right place.

What you will be doing

 As an ML Software Engineer with a focus on low-level and CUDA-based optimizations, you will play a key role in shaping the design, performance, and scalability of Lightricks’ machine learning inference systems. You’ll work on deeply technical challenges at the intersection of GPU acceleration, systems architecture, and ML deployment.
Your expertise in CUDA, C/C++, and performance tuning will be crucial in enhancing runtime efficiency across heterogeneous computing environments. You’ll collaborate with designers, researchers, and backend engineers to build production-grade ML pipelines that are optimized for latency, throughput, and memory use, contributing directly to the infrastructure powering Lightricks' next-generation AI products.
This role is ideal for an engineer with strong systems-level thinking, deep familiarity with GPU internals, and a passion for pushing the boundaries of performance and efficiency in machine learning infrastructure.

Responsibilities

• Design and implement highly optimized GPU-accelerated ML inference systems using CUDA and low-level parallelism techniques
• Optimize memory, compute, and data flow to meet real-time or high-throughput constraints
• Improve the performance, reliability, and observability of our inference backend across diverse compute targets (CPU/GPU)
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams (including researchers, developers, and designers) to deliver efficient and scalable inference solutions
• Contribute to ComfyUI and internal infrastructure to improve the usability and performance of model execution flows
• Investigate performance bottlenecks at all levels of the stack—from Python to kernel-level execution
• Navigate and enhance a large, complex, production-grade codebase
• Drive innovation in low-level system design to support future ML workloads

Your Skills and Experience

• 5+ years of experience in high-performance software engineering
• Advanced proficiency in CUDA, C/C++, and Python, especially in production environments
• Deep understanding of GPU architecture, memory hierarchies, and optimization techniques
• Proven track record of optimizing compute-intensive systems
• Strong system architecture fundamentals, especially around performance, concurrency, and parallelism
• Ability to independently lead deep technical investigations and deliver clean, maintainable solutions
• Collaborative and team-oriented mindset, with experience working across functional teams

Preferred Requirements

• Experience with low-level profiling and debugging tools (e.g., Nsight, perf, gdb, VTune)
• Familiarity with machine learning frameworks (e.g., PyTorch, TensorRT, ONNX Runtime)
• Contributions to performance-critical open-source or ML infrastructure projects
• Experience with cloud infrastructure and GPU scheduling at scale

Who we are

Lightricks is an AI-first company with a mission to bridge the gap between imagination and creation. At our core is LTX-2, an open-source generative video model, built to deliver expressive, high-fidelity video at unmatched speed. It powers both our own products and a growing ecosystem of partners through api integration.

Our flagship products include Facetune and LTX Studio, used by hundreds of millions of users worldwide. We combine deep research, user-first design, and end-to-end execution to bring the future of expression to all.

What you will be doing

As an ML Software Engineer with a focus on low-level and CUDA-based optimizations, you will play a key role in shaping the design, performance, and scalability of Lightricks’ machine learning inference systems. You’ll work on deeply technical challenges at the intersection of GPU acceleration, systems architecture, and ML deployment.
Your expertise in CUDA, C/C++, and performance tuning will be crucial in enhancing runtime efficiency across heterogeneous computing environments. You’ll collaborate with designers, researchers, and backend engineers to build production-grade ML pipelines that are optimized for latency, throughput, and memory use, contributing directly to the infrastructure powering Lightricks' next-generation AI products.
This role is ideal for an engineer with strong systems-level thinking, deep familiarity with GPU internals, and a passion for pushing the boundaries of performance and efficiency in machine learning infrastructure.

Responsibilities

• Design and implement highly optimized GPU-accelerated ML inference systems using CUDA and low-level parallelism techniques
• Optimize memory, compute, and data flow to meet real-time or high-throughput constraints
• Improve the performance, reliability, and observability of our inference backend across diverse compute targets (CPU/GPU)
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams (including researchers, developers, and designers) to deliver efficient and scalable inference solutions
• Contribute to ComfyUI and internal infrastructure to improve usability and performance of model execution flows
• Investigate performance bottlenecks at all levels of the stack—from Python to kernel-level execution
• Navigate and enhance a large, complex, production-grade codebase
• Drive innovation in low-level system design to support future ML workloads

Your Skills and Experience

• 5+ years of experience in high-performance software engineering
• Advanced proficiency in CUDA, C/C++, and Python, especially in production environments
• Deep understanding of GPU architecture, memory hierarchies, and optimization techniques
• Proven track record of optimizing compute-intensive systems
• Strong system architecture fundamentals, especially around performance, concurrency, and parallelism
• Ability to independently lead deep technical investigations and deliver clean, maintainable solutions
• Collaborative and team-oriented mindset, with experience working across functional teams

Preferred Requirements

• Experience with low-level profiling and debugging tools (e.g., Nsight, perf, gdb, VTune)
• Familiarity with machine learning frameworks (e.g., PyTorch, TensorRT, ONNX Runtime)
• Contributions to performance-critical open-source or ML infrastructure projects
• Experience with cloud infrastructure and GPU scheduling at scale

Why Join Us

We’re here to push the boundaries of what’s possible with AI and video - not for the buzz, but for the craft, the challenge, and the chance to make something genuinely new.
We believe in an environment where people are encouraged to think, create, and explore. Real impact happens when people are empowered to experiment, evolve, and elevate together. At Lightricks, every breakthrough starts with great people and a collaborative mindset. If you're looking for a place that combines deep tech, creative energy, and zero buzzword culture, you might be in the right place.

We got you covered: 

• We run daily door-to-door shuttles, offering Car-to-go subscriptions for several locations in central Israel, plus free parking and train-station pickups.
• We’re proud to have 2 chef-led restaurants on site by the legendary Machneyuda Group (yes, that Machneyuda!), plus a bakery nestled in the heart of our office, filled daily with the scent of fresh pastries.
• We empower employees with cutting-edge tools and learning opportunities to grow and succeed through workshops, access and training on platforms, subscriptions, and clear guidelines for responsible AI use.