Key Account Director, OEM - EMEA Germany

Aiven; Germany; Hybrid; EUR 140,000 - 210,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity plan

Hybrid work policy

Professional development budget

Wellbeing program

Time off policy

Job summary

Aiven is hiring a Key Account Director to own our largest OEM and strategic technology partnerships across EMEA. You will drive partner-sourced and partner-influenced revenue, building relationships, programs, and cross-functional alignment to grow ARR.

This builder-operator role requires experience scaling channel and OEM motions within infrastructure software, plus the ability to demonstrate measurable ARR growth. Hybrid work policy and global benefits are offered.

Qualifications

• Track record owning named OEM or strategic partnerships with joint ARR growth.
• Proven indirect sales experience driving partner-sourced and partner-influenced pipeline via deal registration, co-selling, and cloud marketplace motions.
• Domain expertise in infrastructure software with understanding of technical buyers.
• Demonstrated ability to matrix-manage cross-functional teams to execute complex GTM plans.
• Nice to have: experience building a partner program from scratch or scaling hyperscaler private offers, open-source monetization, FED/SLED environments.

Responsibilities

• Own OEM and strategic partnerships across EMEA, driving partner-sourced and partner-influenced ARR targets.
• Build, recruit, and scale joint go-to-market motions across GSIs, RSIs, ISVs, and hyperscalers (AWS, Azure, GCP).
• Negotiate OEM and ISV agreements, including cloud embed deals, private offers, and hyperscaler marketplace transactions.
• Turn net-new or stalled partner relationships into repeatable, self-sustaining revenue engines.
• Align cross-functional teams—sales, solutions architecture, engineering, marketing, and ops—behind joint partner commitments.
• Engage technical buyers and enterprise leaders by speaking to developer-led adoption in open-source data infrastructure.

Skills

OEM partnerships

Strategic partnerships

Indirect sales

Cross-functional leadership

Enterprise sales

Job description

We’re 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 help developers, builders, and creators bring their ideas to life with speed and simplicity, by providing a cloud data platform that makes open-source databases, search, streaming, and application infrastructure easily accessible to everyone.

The role

We're hiring a Key Account Director to own Aiven's largest OEM and strategic technology partnerships across EMEA. You'll drive partner-sourced and partner-influenced revenue — building the relationships, programs, and cross-functional alignment that turn partnerships into a measurable, growing share of ARR. This is a role for a builder-operator: someone who has stood up or scaled channel and OEM motions inside infrastructure software companies before, and has the numbers to show for it.

What you'll do

• We're hiring a Key Account Director to own Aiven's largest OEM and strategic technology partnerships across EMEA. You'll drive partner-sourced and partner-influenced revenue — building the relationshi
• Build, recruit, and scale joint go-to-market motions across GSIs, RSIs, ISVs, and hyperscalers (AWS, Azure, GCP).
• Negotiate OEM and ISV agreements, including cloud embed deals, private offers, and hyperscaler marketplace transactions.
• Turn net-new or stalled partner relationships into repeatable, self-sustaining revenue engines.
• Align cross-functional teams—direct sales, solutions architecture, engineering, marketing, and ops—behind joint partner commitments.
• Engage technical buyers and enterprise leaders by speaking fluently to developer-led adoption in open-source data infrastructure.
• Own and deliver against partner-sourced and partner-influenced ARR targets, pipeline generation, and customer satisfaction metrics.

What we're looking for

• Track record directly owning named OEM or strategic technology partnerships (hardware, cloud, ISV embed) with documented joint ARR growth.
• Proven indirect sales experience driving partner-sourced and partner-influenced pipeline via deal registration, co-selling, and cloud marketplace motions.
• Domain expertise in infrastructure software (data platforms, cloud, open source, DevOps, or middleware) with a strong understanding of technical buyers.
• Demonstrated ability to matrix-manage cross-functional teams (sales, marketing, SAs, engineering, ops) to execute complex joint GTM plans.
• Nice to have: Experience building a partner program from scratch, scaling hyperscaler private offers, navigating open-source monetization models, or operating in FED/SLED environments.

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

• Participate in Aiven’s 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.

Equal Opportunities:
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 [e-mail].