Director, Mechanical Engineering – North America, Data Centers

About Nscale

Nscale is the GPU cloud engineered for AI. We provide cost-effective, high-performance infrastructure for AI start-ups and large enterprise customers. Nscale enables AI-focused companies to achieve superior results by reducing the complexity of AI development. Our GPU cloud bolsters technical capabilities and directly supports strategic business outcomes, including cost management, rapid innovation, and environmental responsibility.

We thrive on a culture of relentless innovation, ownership, and accountability, where every team member takes pride in their work and drives it with excellence and urgency. As an Nscaler, you’ll build trust through openness and transparency, where everyone is inspired to do their best work. If you join our team, you’ll be contributing to building the technology that powers the future.

About the Role

We’re hiring a Director, Mechanical Engineering to lead mechanical design ownership and engineering governance across Nscale’s North America data center portfolio. This is a senior, hands-on leadership role responsible for shaping the mechanical basis of design across multiple U.S. sites, including cooling plant architectures, heat rejection, piping design, water treatment, and control system interfaces.

You’ll play a key role in developing infrastructure purpose-built for high-density AI and liquid-cooled GPU hardware. This includes setting standards for liquid cooling readiness, CDU/HX integration, piping and materials strategy, water quality and treatment, leak detection and containment, and commissioning and acceptance criteria.

What You’ll be Doing

• Own the mechanical basis of design for U.S. data centers, including cooling plant architectures, heat rejection, piping design, water treatment, and control system interfaces.

• Lead concept, schematic, and detailed design reviews for new builds and expansion projects.

• Establish and maintain mechanical design standards and reference architectures to enable repeatable, rapid deployment across the U.S.

• Ensure designs meet availability, maintainability, and efficiency targets and are suitable for high-density AI workloads.

• Lead the development of liquid cooling readiness standards, including direct-to-chip and/or rear-door heat exchanger strategies, CDU/HX integration, piping and materials strategy, water quality and treatment, leak detection, containment, and acceptance criteria.

• Provide engineering support through long-lead equipment procurement, submittals, RFIs, field changes, and issue resolution during construction.

• Select and manage architectural and engineering consultants throughout the design process, from schematic design through construction documents.

• Enforce quality and documentation standards through drawing and specification reviews.

• Lead review of internal and external third-party CFD studies to validate airflow management, temperature compliance, and thermal resilience across the site.

• Partner cross-functionally with Construction, Commissioning, Operations, Procurement, and product/platform stakeholders to ensure mechanical systems meet business and customer requirements.

• Implement lessons learned from deployments to improve reliability, maintainability, cooling performance, and energy efficiency.

• Build and lead a high-performing team of engineers, including hiring, mentoring, performance management, and career development.

• Support mechanical technical due diligence for potential greenfield, brownfield, and colocation sites.

• Assess cooling architecture, redundancy, capacity headroom, maintainability, operational maturity, and fit for high-density AI workloads.

• Review landlord/operator documentation, including basis of design, one-lines, P&IDs, sequences of operation, maintenance records, incident history, and commissioning reports.

• Define and negotiate mechanical lease exhibits and technical schedules, including capacity commitments, metering approach, operating envelopes, maintenance windows, response SLAs, and change control requirements.

• Support early-stage site screening by defining mechanical utility and constructability requirements, including cooling approach, water strategy, heat rejection constraints, climate considerations, and expansion capacity.

• Assess site constraints and delivery risks, including heat rejection feasibility, plant room planning, yard requirements, equipment setbacks, and upgrade pathways.

About You

• Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering.

• Professional Engineering License.

• 5+ years of mechanical engineering experience in mission-critical facilities, with significant time in data center design.

• 3+ years of engineering leadership experience, including people leadership and/or leading large multi-site programmes.

• Strong understanding of cooling systems for high-density compute, including air and liquid-cooled strategies, heat rejection options, redundancy models, hydronic systems, piping design, equipment selection, and controls sequences.

• Experience working with U.S. engineering firms, AHJs, and state/local code environments.

• Strong presence and decision-making capability.

• Pragmatic, risk-based leadership style suited to fast-paced construction environments.

• High judgement in high-consequence scenarios.

• Ability to challenge delivery teams while maintaining strong partnership and trust.

Why this role matters

This role helps define the mechanical architecture behind Nscale’s next generation of AI-ready data centers in North America. Your work will directly influence the performance, scalability, reliability, and efficiency of facilities designed to support high-density GPU infrastructure at speed and scale.

What We Can Offer You

At Nscale, you’ll find a collaborative, supportive, and innovative environment where your contributions drive real impact. We’re building something ambitious, and we want you at the centre of it.

We offer a highly competitive package, including base salary and equity, with regular compensation reviews.

You’ll have the opportunity to grow quickly, take ownership, challenge the status quo, and help shape how we scale.

We work with a human-first approach to flexibility, giving Nscalers the autonomy to deliver in a way that works for their lives while staying closely connected to a high-performing remote-first team.

Equal Opportunities Statement

We strongly encourage applications from people of colour, the LGBTQ+ community, people with disabilities, neurodivergent people, parents, carers, and people from lower socio-economic backgrounds. If there’s anything we can do to accommodate your specific situation, please let us know.

The responsibilities outlined in this job description are not exhaustive and are intended to provide a general overview of the position. The employee may be required to perform additional duties, tasks, and responsibilities as assigned by management, consistent with the skills and qualifications required for the role.