ISV Partnerships Lead
About the Team
We are a small and fast-moving partnerships team that shapes and executes OpenAI’s most important collaborations. Your mission is to build and lead our business with independent software vendors, from native AI companies building in our programs to technology companies taking new products to market with OpenAI’s models and products. You will help partners build, launch, and grow differentiated products while working closely with our sales and product organizations.
About the Role
You are a senior partnerships leader with strong judgment, high ownership, and a track record of building consequential ISV relationships. You can establish durable executive partnerships, lead complex product and commercial negotiations, and move fluently from market strategy to integration, launch, adoption, and growth. You are highly commercial, technically fluent, and comfortable operating where there is no playbook.
In this role, you will:
- Define OpenAI’s ISV partnership strategy, priorities, segmentation, and business goals.
- Recruit and manage a portfolio of high-impact software partners across horizontal and vertical applications.
- Structure and negotiate partnerships spanning product integration, model adoption, commercial terms, distribution, and joint go-to-market.
- Develop joint business plans and executive governance with strategic partners.
- Help partners move from initial build to launch, customer adoption, expansion, and scaled consumption.
- Create repeatable co-build, co-sell, co-market, and marketplace motions.
- Serve as the voice of ISVs internally, shaping product requirements, developer experience, economics, and partner programs.
- Track partner pipeline, launches, adoption, consumption, customer impact, and ecosystem growth.
- Establish the team structure and operating model needed to scale the ISV business.
You might thrive in this role if you have:
- 12+ years of experience in technology partnerships, business development, platform ecosystems, or enterprise software.
- Proven experience leading strategic ISV relationships and negotiating complex product and commercial partnerships.
- Strong understanding of AI platforms, SaaS business models, cloud marketplaces, and enterprise go-to-market.
- Demonstrated ability to manage a portfolio while personally driving the highest-impact partnerships.
- Credibility with partner executives and with product, engineering, sales, finance, legal, and marketing teams.
- Strong strategic and commercial judgment, technical fluency, and comfort operating through ambiguity.
- Outstanding communication, executive presence, and cross-functional leadership in a fast-moving technology company.