Business Unit Lead – Electric Cooking (Restaurants & Institutions)

About the role

BURN is looking for a commercially driven leader to build and own its Commercial Electric Business Unit, delivering electric cooking solutions to restaurants and institutions across Africa. This senior role offers full P&L ownership, requiring the definition of strategy, product‑market fit, go‑to‑market engine, and revenue scaling across multiple markets.

Key responsibilities

• Own the BU P&L, set revenue targets, margins, budgets and unit economics across all markets.
• Develop and execute a pan‑African go‑to‑market strategy for restaurants, institutional kitchens and catering, prioritising markets by grid reliability, tariffs and demand.
• Define the commercial model – direct sales, financing/leasing, carbon‑financed subsidies and channel partnerships.
• Build and manage a pipeline of institutional clients, lead high‑value negotiations and close flagship anchor accounts.
• Establish partnerships with utilities, energy‑access programmes, DFIs and financiers to de‑risk acquisition and enable asset financing.
• Act as the voice of the commercial customer, feeding field insights into product and engineering teams.
• Recruit, lead and develop a pan‑African commercial team and work with country teams to build installation, maintenance and after‑sales capabilities.
• Collaborate with the carbon team to structure carbon revenue streams and embed MRV requirements.

Required profile

• 8+ years of commercial leadership experience, including at least 3 years in B2B sales, key‑account management or business‑unit leadership.
• Proven track record building or scaling a business line, product category or market entry – preferably in energy, appliances, FMCG/HORECA, food‑service equipment or e‑mobility.
• Experience selling to institutions or the hospitality sector (restaurants, hotels, schools, hospitals, government programmes) is strongly preferred.
• Demonstrated P&L ownership with strong commercial and financial acumen (pricing, unit economics, financing models).
• Multi‑country Africa experience.

Required skills