Warehouse Manager

More than one million people in the United States today are fighting blood cancer. While a traditional allogeneic stem cell transplant has been the best hope for many, the transplant itself can prove fatal or lead to serious conditions, such as graft vs. host disease. Orca Bio is a commercial-stage biotechnology company redefining the transplant process by developing next-generation cell therapies with the goal of providing significantly better survival rates with dramatically fewer risks. With our purified, high-precision cell therapies we hope to not only replace patients' blood and immune systems with healthy ones, but also restore their lives.   We have built a state-of-the-art, 100,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in Sacramento, CA (7910 Metro Air Pkwy) to ensure the consistent and reliable delivery of our high-precision cell therapy products. This site is essential to advancing our clinical pipeline and supporting future commercial availability of our life-saving therapies.

The Manager, Warehouse oversees warehouse operations and material flow to support clinical and commercial cell and gene therapy manufacturing. This role ensures compliant receipt, storage, inventory management, kitting, and timely delivery of materials to production suites, laboratories, and site support areas. The Manager maintains GMP-compliant warehouse practices, inventory accuracy, and material readiness while leading material handlers and establishing scalable processes to support operational growth.

Physical Demands & Work Conditions

• Production Associates: Must have visual acuity of 20/20 (corrected or uncorrected) and normal color vision to safely perform critical tasks such as visual inspection of materials, equipment, and labeling, including distinguishing color-coded components in a GMP environment.
• Must meet cleanroom gowning requirements, including wearing full gowning (face coverings, gloves, hoods, goggles) for up to 3 consecutive hours at a time, minimal movement in the cleanroom, and working with or around human blood, blood-derived materials, cells, other biological materials, and alcohol-based sprays. Use of cosmetics (makeup, painted nails), jewelry, or facial piercings is not permitted in the cleanroom, and any skin conditions that cause shedding must be disclosed.
• Must be comfortable regularly participating in video-based meetings.

Essential Duties & Key Responsibilities:

• Warehouse Operations & GMP Compliance: Oversee daily warehouse operations, including material receipt, inspection, labeling, storage, put-away, and distribution, ensuring compliance with applicable GMP/GTP/GDP requirements, site procedures, and safety standards.
• Inventory Management & Accuracy: Maintain accurate inventory records, material status, storage locations, and traceability within inventory management systems. Oversee cycle counts, inventory reconciliations, discrepancy investigations, and corrective actions to support inventory accuracy and material availability.
• Material Receipt & Control: Ensure incoming raw materials, reagents, consumables, and packaging components are received, documented, and appropriately identified, stored, and controlled according to their requirements and quality status before use.
• Production Material Supply & Kitting: Coordinate material picking, kitting, and staging to support manufacturing schedules and patient-specific production needs. Ensure kits are accurate, complete, appropriately controlled, and delivered to production in the required quantities and timeframes.
• Material Distribution & Point-of-Use Replenishment: Oversee the timely transport of materials to production suite material airlocks (MALs) and the replenishment of materials in cleanrooms, gowning areas, laboratories, packaging areas, and training spaces, maintaining appropriate stock levels and material controls.
• Stocking & Kanban Management: Establish and maintain stocking strategies, point-of-use inventory, and Kanban replenishment systems for frequently used consumables. Monitor usage and replenishment needs to prevent stockouts, minimize excess inventory, and support efficient material flow.
• Team Leadership & Workforce Development: Lead, develop, and prioritize the work of material handlers, ensuring adequate coverage, clear work assignments, adherence to procedures, and completion of required GMP, safety, and job-specific training.
• Cross-Functional Planning & Coordination: Partner with Production Planning, Material Planning, Procurement, Manufacturing, Quality, and Facilities to align material availability, receiving priorities, inventory replenishment, and delivery schedules with manufacturing demand and site operations.
• Continuous Improvement & Operational Readiness: Develop and monitor warehouse performance metrics, including inventory accuracy, material availability, kitting readiness, replenishment timeliness, and stockouts. Drive process standardization, deviation reduction, workflow efficiency, and scalable warehouse practices to support commercial growth.
• Performs other duties as assigned.

Minimum Experience, Education, Certifications, Licenses:

• Bachelor’s degree in Supply Chain Management, Logistics, Business Administration, or related field (or equivalent experience) preferred. 
• 5+ years of experience in warehouse operations, with at least 2 years in a supervisory or management role. 
• Certification in Production and Inventory Management or Logistics, Transportation and Distribution are a plus
• Strong knowledge of warehouse management software (WMS) and experience with inventory management or ERP software.
• Proven ability to manage and motivate a team effectively.
• Excellent organizational and problem-solving skills.
• Strong communication skills, both written and verbal.
• Knowledge of safety regulations and compliance requirements in a warehouse environment
• Familiarity with Good Manufacturing Practices, document management systems, electronic batch records preferred

Reporting Structure & Authority:

• Direct reports include: 5-7 including Material Handlers and Warehouse Coordinators  
• Oversees the daily workflow of the department, ensuring standard work is consistently performed and that all activities comply with safety and company policies.
• Recruits, interviews, hires, and trains new staff to support operational needs.
• Provides constructive and timely feedback through regular performance evaluations.
• Performs other related supervisory responsibilities as assigned.

The anticipated annual salary range (listed above) for this job is based on prior experience in the role/industry, education, location, internal equity, and other job-related factors as permitted by law. For remote-based positions, this range may vary based on your local market. Full-time employment positions will also be eligible to receive pre-IPO equity and annual bonus, in addition to competitive medical, dental, and vision benefits, PTO, 401(k) plan, life and accidental death and disability coverage, and parental leave benefits. Other perks include subsidized daily lunches and snacks at our on-site locations.   Who we are   We are driven by a passion for science and compassion for patients. We act with urgency to ensure our treatments are one day accessible to all who need them.   We live by our core values of passion, courage, and integrity. Excellence in our work means the chance to unlock a better quality of life for our patients, and with that comes tremendous responsibility.   We innovate on a path that hasn’t been paved. We embrace an entrepreneurial spirit and take calculated risks to achieve our mission. We aren’t afraid to ask “why not” and challenge the status quo.   We maintain a start-up culture of camaraderie and leadership by example, regardless of title.   We’re proud to be an equal opportunity employer, and recognize that celebrating our differences creates stronger, lasting solutions that better serve our team, our patients and their healthcare providers.   Notice to staffing firms   Orca Bio does not accept resumes from staffing agencies with which we do not have a written agreement and specific engagement for a particular opening. Our employment activities, inquiries and offers are managed through our HR/Talent team, and all candidates are presented through this channel only. We do not accept unsolicited resumes, and we rarely outsource recruitment.