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Ho Chi Minh City

Financial Controller

Own the numbers. Build the function. Keep the board informed.

What This Role Is

Zeya Labs operates with board-level governance and expects financial transparency and rigour at that standard. This role is the financial backbone of the company - responsible for ensuring that the money is managed properly, reported accurately, and that the board has what it needs to make decisions.

The company is well funded, with a multi-million dollar operating budget. This is not a role for someone who has managed petty cash and a few invoices. The financial complexity is real from day one.

This is not a shared-services role. You are not inheriting a finished function. You will build the financial controls, reporting cadence, and operational finance processes that Zeya Labs runs on - and you will own them.

Concretely, the Financial Controller is responsible for three things:

  • -Financial management and control. Budgets, forecasts, actuals, variance analysis. Month-end close, accounts payable and receivable, payroll oversight. The numbers are accurate and the CEO is never surprised.
  • -Board and group reporting. Monthly board pack financials, statutory compliance, and the financial reporting cadence the board runs on. You own this end to end.
  • -Operations finance and team oversight. Vendor contracts, entity establishment costs, software licence spend, and the Operations Manager who reports into this function.

What You Will Actually Do

Financial management and control

  • -Own the annual budget and rolling forecast; track actuals against plan and flag variances early
  • -Manage month-end and year-end close processes, including reconciliations and accruals
  • -Oversee accounts payable - vendor invoices, contractor payments, expense reimbursements
  • -Oversee payroll administration directly, or in coordination with group functions where applicable
  • -Maintain a clean audit trail and ensure internal controls are fit for a board-governed entity
  • -Manage banking relationships and cash flow forecasting

Board and group reporting

  • -Prepare the financial section of the monthly board pack - actuals, forecast, burn rate, key variances
  • -Manage statutory compliance: tax filings, corporate secretarial, local regulatory requirements in Vietnam
  • -Support the annual audit process and act as the primary contact for external auditors
  • -Contribute to the Business Value Realisation framework - ensuring cost savings and AI value delivery are tracked and reported with financial rigour

Operations finance and team oversight

  • -Own vendor contract administration - NDAs, MSAs, SOWs - in coordination with the CEO
  • -Track software licence and infrastructure spend against budget; flag consolidation opportunities
  • -Line-manage the Finance & Payroll Administrator and Operations Manager; set clear expectations and maintain quality
  • -Support entity establishment activities - legal entity costs, corporate structure, registered office
  • -Build financial processes from scratch where none exist; document them so the function is not person-dependent

Who We Are Looking For

You are a qualified accountant - ACCA, CPA, or equivalent - with seven to ten years of experience, some of which has been in a standalone or regional controller role where you were the most senior finance person in the room.

You are comfortable operating without a large finance team behind you. You can do the technical accounting work yourself and you know when to bring in external support. You are not waiting to be told what needs doing - you can see the gaps and you close them.

A few things that matter to us:

  • -You have strong technical accounting skills and can produce board-quality financials without a template handed to you.
  • -You have worked in a standalone or regional controller role and are comfortable being the most senior finance person in the building.
  • -You know Vietnam statutory requirements inside and out - tax, corporate compliance, labour law - and you have the relationships to navigate them.
  • -You are comfortable with ambiguity in a startup environment but uncompromising on financial controls and reporting accuracy.
  • -You communicate clearly with non-finance stakeholders - the board needs to understand the numbers, not just receive them.
  • -You are discreet. You will have full visibility into compensation, vendor contracts, and board-level financial information.

Experience in a technology business, professional services firm, or group shared-services environment is a plus. Fluency in English is required; Vietnamese is an advantage.

What We Offer

We are a small team with a serious remit. That combination creates something that is genuinely hard to find elsewhere.

  • -Autonomy. You own the financial function. There is no regional finance director above you, no group process to route things through, no committee to approve your chart of accounts. You build it the way it should be built.
  • -Board exposure. You will present directly to senior decision-makers and have full visibility into how the company operates at the highest level. That access is real, not ceremonial.
  • -Flexibility. We care about output, not hours. Hybrid working is the default and we manage by results.
  • -Real complexity, small team. A multi-million dollar budget, board-level governance, Vietnam statutory requirements, and a company being built from scratch - handled by a tight team without layers of overhead.
  • -The chance to set the standard. You are not inheriting someone else's processes. What you build here is yours.
  • -An AI-native environment - and the support to get there. We will help you get comfortable with AI tools as part of how you work. You do not need to arrive knowing them.

The Practical Details

Location

Ho Chi Minh City

Reports to

CEO, Zeya Labs

Direct reports

Operations Manager

Send us an email at build@zeyalabs.ai

Location

Ho Chi Minh City

Reports to

CEO, Zeya Labs

Direct reports

Operations Manager

Send us an email at build@zeyalabs.ai