Key Account Director - OEM

Aiven•Austin, TX

4d•Remote

About The Position

Aiven is seeking a Key Account Director to manage Aiven's largest OEM and strategic technology partnerships across AMER. The role involves driving partner-sourced and partner-influenced revenue by building relationships, programs, and cross-functional alignment to increase ARR through partnerships. This position is ideal for an experienced builder-operator who has successfully established or scaled channel and OEM operations within infrastructure software companies and can demonstrate measurable results.

Requirements

Experience as a builder-operator who has stood up or scaled channel and OEM motions inside infrastructure software companies.
Proven track record of driving measurable results in OEM and strategic partnerships.
Experience embedded in the channel: recruiting partners, building programs, negotiating OEM and ISV agreements.
Ability to create new habits between direct sellers and the partner ecosystem in both startup and enterprise environments.
Experience selling data, cloud, open source, DevOps, or middleware products.
Understanding of technical buyers and developer-led adoption.
Quantified revenue impact: demonstrated growth rate, customer satisfaction rate, and contribution to ARR milestones.
Experience with cross-functional orchestration, including matrix-managing sales, marketing, SAs, engineering, and ops.
Ecosystem fluency across GSIs (Accenture, PwC, EY, Tech Mahindra), RSIs (CDW, Insight, AHEAD, Optiv), ISVs, and the big-3 clouds (AWS, Azure, GCP).

Nice To Haves

Built a channel or partner program from scratch.
Hyperscaler marketplace and co-sell experience: AWS, Azure, or GCP private offers and marketplace transactions.
Experience as part of a company through an IPO or major funding milestone.
Fluent in open source commercial models: subscription, support, managed-service monetization.
Public sector exposure (FED/SLED) as an additional partner-led motion.
Managed direct or matrixed teams.

Responsibilities

Own Aiven's largest OEM and strategic technology partnerships across AMER.
Drive partner-sourced and partner-influenced revenue.
Build relationships, programs, and cross-functional alignment to grow partnerships.
Recruit partners, build programs, and negotiate OEM and ISV agreements.
Orchestrate sales, marketing, engineering, and product teams to grow joint business.
Take a partner relationship from a standing start or stalled state and turn it into a self-sustaining revenue engine.
Directly own named OEM relationships (hardware, cloud, ISV embed deals) and demonstrate documented joint revenue growth.
Manage pipeline track record showing partner-sourced and partner-influenced deals (deal registration, PIO).
Execute joint go-to-market plans by matrix-managing sales, marketing, SAs, engineering, and ops.
Leverage ecosystem fluency across GSIs, RSIs, ISVs, and major cloud providers (AWS, Azure, GCP).