[Hiring] Sales Lead @Focal

Role Description

Focal is the world's first autonomous personal comfort platform: an AI-enabled robotic heating system that delivers individualized warmth to each guest in real time. Rather than conditioning entire spaces, we heat people directly, the way modern lighting illuminates with intention. The result: up to 80% in energy savings, a 25% increase in patio seating capacity, two hours of labor savings per shift, and a 25% jump in five-star reviews for our restaurant partners.

We're expanding to Southern California, and we're looking for the person who will own it. This is not a territory you inherit. It's one you build. As Focal's first hire in the Los Angeles area, you'll be responsible for:

• Owning the Southern California market.
• Building our pipeline from scratch: identifying the right restaurant groups, hospitality operators, and multi-unit chains, and running account-based campaigns to open and close them.
• Driving account-based strategy: developing a target account list, researching key stakeholders, building multi-threaded relationships within priority accounts, and executing a disciplined approach to winning new business.
• Representing Focal on the ground: attending industry events, building a local network in hospitality and food & beverage, and ensuring the right operators know who we are and what we've built.
• Laying the foundation for a team: contributing to hiring decisions, onboarding future reps, and helping define the playbook for how we sell in new markets.

Qualifications

• 4–8 years of B2B sales experience, with a track record of owning complex, multi-stakeholder deals from prospecting to close.
• Proven experience in account-based selling: you know how to build a target list, map an org, and run a disciplined outreach motion.
• Deep familiarity with the Los Angeles, Orange County, and San Diego market; existing relationships in hospitality, food & beverage, or real estate are a strong plus.
• Comfort with ambiguity: you've built pipeline in a new territory or for a new product before, and you didn't wait for leads to come to you.
• Early management instincts: you care about developing others and want to build something, not just hit a number.
• Genuine enthusiasm for what Focal is building: you understand why the product matters and can convey that authentically to operators.

Benefits

• Named to Fast Company's World's Most Innovative Companies of 2026 alongside Waymo, Boston Dynamics, and Toast.
• Proven, measurable results: customers capture up to 80% energy savings, 25% more seating capacity, and a 25% jump in five-star reviews.
• Backed by Collaborative Fund, Third Sphere, Brainstorm Ventures, and leading angels across hospitality and energy.
• A founding team with deep technical and operational chops: Tesla, Zoox, Stanford, Harvard, and Carnegie Mellon robotics.
• Restaurants are just the beginning: Focal's platform is built to extend into homes, offices, warehouses, transit shelters, and hospitals.
• First-mover advantage in one of the most important hospitality markets in the country, with full support from the founding team.

Company Description

Focal is a San Francisco-based robotics company creating a world where comfort is personal, effortless, and sustainable. Through AI-enabled hardware, our personal comfort system delivers targeted, autonomous warmth while eliminating the energy and cost inefficiencies of traditional heating systems. We've raised $5M in funding and logged 30,000+ hours of live operation across Michelin-star restaurant groups, regional chains, and independent operators.

Learn more at focalheat.co or reach out at [email protected] .