Commercial Manager Global Expansion

Zovea Animal Health; Amsterdam; On-site; EUR 70,000 - 120,000; Full time

Job summary

Zovea Animal Health is seeking a Commercial Manager Global Expansion to spearhead growth outside Europe. You will build new markets from the ground up and hand off after establishing lanes.

This is a hunting role, not account management, requiring travel and direct engagement with potential customers across multiple regions. You will work with sourcing, finance, and leadership to drive export success.

Qualifications

• Requires track record of opening markets or accounts from scratch.
• Experience across multiple cultural contexts is highly valued.
• Fluent English; additional languages are a plus.

Responsibilities

• Identify, target, and open new markets outside the EU with priority on high-potential countries.
• Build and maintain a pipeline of new export accounts from cold outreach to first trade.
• Manage full deal cycles independently: sourcing, pricing, negotiation, compliance, and closing.
• Develop market intelligence on regulations, pricing dynamics, competition, and customer structure per target country.
• Collaborate with sourcing to ensure supply availability and competitive pricing for export markets.
• Represent Zovea Animal Health at international trade fairs and events.
• Maintain a structured account and pipeline overview in CRM according to agreed processes.
• Feed market intelligence back into the commercial team and trade marketing function.
• Contribute to the export business plan: country prioritization, revenue targets, and go-to-market approach.
• Willing to travel frequently; role lives in the field.

Skills

Drive

Resourcefulness

Negotiation

Cultural intelligence

Business insight

CRM

Excel

Regulatory knowledge

International logistics

Tools

CRM

Excel

Job description

The Commercial Manager Global Expansion is Zovea Animal Health's commercial pioneer in markets beyond Europe. You build relationships from scratch where Zovea is unknown, then hand off once the lane is established. This is a hunting role, not account management, and you go first every time.

What you'll do

• Identify, target, and open new markets outside the EU, with priority on high-potential countries based on the export scoring matrix.
• Build and maintain a pipeline of new export accounts from cold outreach to first trade.
• Manage full deal cycles independently: sourcing, pricing, negotiation, compliance, and closing.
• Develop market intelligence on regulations, pricing dynamics, competitive landscape, and customer structure per target country.
• Collaborate with sourcing to ensure supply availability and competitive pricing for export markets.
• Represent Zovea Animal Health at international trade fairs and industry events.
• Maintain a structured account and pipeline overview in CRM according to agreed ways of working.
• Feed market intelligence back into the commercial team and trade marketing function.
• Contribute to the export business plan: country prioritization, revenue targets, and go-to-market approach.
• Willing to travel frequently. This role lives in the field.

Who We're Looking For:

Core competencies

• Drive: commercially hungry, focused on margin and closed deals, not activity for its own sake.
• Resourcefulness: builds a way in where there's no network or playbook to follow.
• Negotiation: earns trust fast and closes in unfamiliar settings.
• Cultural intelligence: reads the room and shifts negotiation style across contexts without being told to.
• Business insight: reads the commercial logic of a market and positions Zovea's offer to fit it.
• CRM: pipeline management, deal tracking, activity logging.
• Excel: pricing models, margin calculations, deal structuring.
• Regulatory knowledge: import requirements and product registration basics across non-EU markets.
• International logistics: Incoterms, documentation, freight coordination.

Experience and profile

• 4 to 7 years in international B2B trading, export sales, or business development.
• A track record of opening markets or accounts from scratch, not managing accounts someone else built.
• Experience across multiple cultural contexts, ideally the Middle East, Asia, Latin America, or Africa.
• A self-starter who doesn't need daily management to stay sharp.
• A background in animal health, pharma, food, or agri is a plus.
• Fluent English; Arabic, French, Spanish, or Mandarin are a plus.

What You Get:

• Full ownership of Zovea's export division from day one, build it your way.
• Direct access to sourcing, finance, and leadership, no bureaucracy.
• A growing, ambitious team that values commercial grit over corporate polish.
• The opportunity to put Zovea on the map in markets where nobody knows us yet.