Strategic Account Executive

Aiven is putting its first sales seat on the ground in the Bay Area working exclusively with Digital Natives.

The AI-native companies being built here are choosing their data infrastructure now that means the event backbone their agents and pipelines run on the analytics store their traces and evaluations land in the Postgres that becomes their system of record the index behind retrieval. This seat is designed to be where those companies are today: early engineering-led moving fast and about to make decisions they will live with for years.

Youll be in the room when those decisions get made and stay in it as they scale. That is what partnership means at this stage and it is why the outcome you sell is not a database.

It is a product that ships sooner because the team builds features instead of running infrastructure. A first workload in production in days through the Terraform provider and a Marketplace private offer not a procurement cycle. A cost line that scales with usage rather than with the platform team they would otherwise have to hire. And a data layer built on open source on every major cloud or in their own account so the first enterprise customers compliance questions and the next rounds growth dont force a re-platform. Your job is to be first and to turn usage into durable commercial relationships.

Were a global team of over 400 people working together to push the boundaries of open-source technology and multi-cloud solutions. Our vision is to become the trusted Data & AI Platform for everyone leveraging the most popular open-source technologies like Apache Kafka Aiven for PostgreSQL Aiven for Clickhouse and Aiven for OpenSearch. to help companies accelerate time-to-market drive efficiency and build innovative solutions across any cloud.

You will drive strategic growth by acquiring new Aiven customers and expanding relationships.
This is a high-impact quota-carrying role focused on new logo acquisition growing usage over baseline and increasing customer commitments in one of Aivens most important markets.

In this role you will engage C-level and senior stakeholders across both technical and business functions (e.g. CTO CIO VP Engineering Head of Product) at scale-stage AI-native companies headquartered in the Bay Area. These may be model builders agent and AI-application companies AI infrastructure and developer-tools companies and the product companies rebuilding their data plane for AI workloads. They are typically engineering-led.

Youll leverage Aivens proven sales methodologies MEDDPICC qualification the Challenger Sales approach and Command of the Message to manage complex sales cycles from prospecting to close.

• Get there first. Work a named list of Bay Area AI-native accounts. Be in the meetups hackathons founder dinners and engineering offices where new workloads get decided and find the team that is about to need streaming analytics or Postgres. Convert usage into committed contracts once the run-rate justifies it.
• Sell the way AI companies buy. At many of these companies engineers and increasingly their coding agents choose infrastructure through Terraform APIs and docs not RFPs. Understand that path well enough to help people through it. Land usage-based customers through self-serve or Marketplace private offers then convert them to committed contracts once usage justifies it.
• Identify Opportunities forcompetitive displacement within current customers and new prospect customers. Find teams on Cloud especially on Google Cloud who are reconsidering Take them from a migration assessment with the Solution Architect to a committed deal-registered contract.
• Co-sell with Cloud partners. Marketplace private offers startup credit programmes deal registration on every co-sell opportunity and the Google account teams that cover your accounts.
• Build the network that feeds the territory. Founders platform engineers investors and their portfolio teams. Work with Aiven for Startups and our investor relationships. Source speakers and co-hosts for Aivens Bay Area meetups and developer evenings with our marketing team.
• Qualify as a diagnostic forecast on evidence. MEDDPICC in Salesforce: a named champion an engaged economic buyer and a quantified impact
• Bring the market back. Close the feedback loop share learnings with Aiven product and leadership on what AI-native teams are building what they choose instead of Aiven and why in specifics.

• New logos closed at technical high-growth companies selling data developer or cloud infrastructure on usage- or consumption-based pricing. You can show the numbers: quota attainment deal sizes and how much of your pipeline you sourced yourself.
• Youve built a territory from a standing start before and youd choose to do it again.
• Enough technical depth to hold your own with a platform engineer. You know what Kafka ClickHouse PostgreSQL and OpenSearch are for how AI applications and agents use them and what a Terraform-provisioned evaluation looks like.
• Fluency in MEDDPICC and Command of the Message and the ability to change a buyers plan with a technical/business insight rather than a slide.
• Youre already part of the Bay Area AI and developer ecosystem or you can show youve built a network like it before.
• You live in the Bay Area. This is an in-person role split between our San Francisco office and your customers offices.

If you dont match every line but you have built a territory in a technical market and can show the numbers apply.

• First 90 days: fifteen first meetings with priority accounts five qualified opportunities your first pay-as-you-go lands and deal registration on every Cloud partner co-sell opportunities.
• Six months: ten qualified opportunities your first new Bay Area logos consuming or your first cometitive displacement win and the first usage-based customer converted to a commitment.
• Twelve months: eight new Bay Area logos consuming or two competitive displacement wins with usage-based customers converted to committed contracts behind them.

Youll hear from our Talent Experience team within five days of applying. From there:

• A conversation with one of our Talent Experience Partners.
• A depth-of-expertise interview with the hiring manager. Bring your numbers. Depending on timing this may be in person)
• A working session with the team: youll build a first-90-days plan for a set of real Bay Area accounts and run a live discovery conversation with our Solution Architect.
• An Aiven Values interview.

If you think Aiven is the place for you and that our Values align with yours send us your resume and well get in touch!

On-Target Earnings $400K $450K Equity

Our global benefits are designed to help you thrive and grow personally and professionally:

• Participate in Aivens equity plan.
• Balance work and life with our hybrid work policy.
• Choose the equipment you need to set yourself up for success.
• Use your Professional Development Plan budget for learning opportunities.
• Receive holistic wellbeing support through our global Employee Assistance Program.
• Inquire about our Global Time Off Commitment (Parental and Sick Leave as well as Personal Time)
• Enjoy country-specific benefits for our global cast.

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Aiven provides equal employment opportunities to all qualified employees and applicants for employment without regard to age gender identity national or ethnic origin religion sexual orientation physical and mental ability marital and family status or without regard to any other similar personal attributes. Aiven complies with applicable local laws governing non-discrimination in employment in every location in which the company operates. This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment including recruiting hiring placement promotion termination layoff transfer leaves of absence compensation training and any other terms and conditions related to employment.

At Aiven we are committed to providing reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities or special needs in our working environment and job application procedures. We make all reasonable accommodations for persons with disabilities or who otherwise need support to thrive in the workplace. We are committed to continuously improving workplace accessibility. There is an option to request a discussion in the application process but if you have any questions before applying please write to us at .