Strategic Account Executive, EMEA (100% hunting role)

Job description

Sonatype is the software supply chain security company. Sonatype is accelerating the future of agentic software development. As developers and AI agents build faster than ever, enterprises need a new level of control, visibility, and confidence at the moment software is assembled. Our Nexus One platform helps development, security, and platform teams govern the components, dependencies, models, and artifacts that power modern applications without slowing innovation down. We are uniquely positioned to lead this next era. Sonatype operates both Maven Central, one of the world’s largest public open source registries, and Nexus Repository, a top-ranked enterprise repository used by thousands of organizations and over 70% of the Fortune 100. With over 1 trillion downloads annually across our ecosystem, we have unmatched visibility into how software is published, consumed, and propagated. That insight helps our customers make smarter decisions earlier, reduce rework, avoid security surprises, and ship AI-powered software with greater speed and confidence. We are seeking an exceptional Enterprise Account Executive to accelerate Sonatype's growth across one of the most commercially significant and competitive enterprise technology markets. This is a pure new-logo acquisition role for an accomplished enterprise hunter who thrives on creating opportunities, displacing established competitors and winning complex, high-value enterprise business. As artificial intelligence transforms how software is developed, organisations are facing unprecedented challenges around open source security, software supply chain integrity, developer productivity and governance. Sonatype operates at the intersection of these challenges, helping some of the world's largest organisations build and deploy software securely through industry-leading software supply chain intelligence and an integrated platform spanning repository management, application security and malware prevention. The territory presents an opportunity for a commercially ambitious seller to develop strategic enterprise relationships, challenge established technology providers and build a significant new-business pipeline. You will own a defined portfolio of enterprise prospects, with a clear mandate to identify, develop and close new-logo opportunities. This is not an account management position, nor is it a role designed around managing an inherited customer portfolio. Your success will be defined by the new customers you acquire, the competitive opportunities you create and the revenue you generate. You will be expected to operate confidently against an annual quota, bringing the commercial discipline, enterprise sales experience and competitive intensity required to deliver sustained performance. We're particularly interested in speaking with consistently high-performing enterprise sellers who have achieved President's Club, Pinnacle Club or equivalent recognition and can demonstrate repeated success in complex, competitive technology markets. ### Our role in detail: **Territory Development & Strategic New-Logo Acquisition:** - Develop and execute a comprehensive enterprise territory strategy across prospect accounts. - Take full accountability for new-logo acquisition, building and converting a sustainable pipeline of high-value enterprise opportunities. - Identify and prioritise strategic prospects based on enterprise size, software development complexity, security maturity, competitive landscape and commercial potential. - Build sophisticated account plans identifying organisational structures, executive stakeholders, buying committees, incumbent technology providers and potential entry points. - Generate significant self-sourced pipeline through proactive outbound prospecting, executive engagement, targeted account-based campaigns and strategic networking. - Establish relationships with CIOs, CTOs, CISOs, VP Engineering, DevSecOps, Platform Engineering and Application Security leadership. - Engage enterprise prospects before formal buying processes begin, helping customers recognise challenges and opportunities they may not yet be actively addressing. - Collaborate with Marketing, Sales Engineering, Channel and executive leadership to develop coordinated account acquisition strategies. - Identify opportunities to position Sonatype's broader software supply chain platform through compelling customer-specific business cases. - Maintain strong commercial discipline around pipeline coverage, opportunity qualification, deal progression and forecasting. **Competitive Displacement & Enterprise Deal Execution:** Competitive displacement will be a significant component of this role. We are looking for someone who understands the enterprise cybersecurity, DevSecOps and developer tooling landscape and is confident challenging established technology providers. You will be expected to: - Identify enterprise accounts using competing or incumbent software supply chain, repository management and application security technologies. - Develop account-specific competitive displacement strategies based on customer challenges, technical requirements and business outcomes. - Demonstrate a strong understanding of the competitive landscape, including organisations such as JFrog, Snyk, Black Duck, Mend, GitHub, GitLab, Checkmarx and Veracode. - Understand where Sonatype's intelligence, security capabilities, platform breadth and preventative approach provide meaningful customer differentiation. - Lead sophisticated enterprise sales cycles involving multiple stakeholders, technical evaluations, proofs of value, procurement and executive decision-making. - Develop strong economic buyer relationships and build compelling financial, operational and security business cases. - Apply structured enterprise sales methodologies such as MEDDPICC to establish clear qualification, decision criteria, competitive positioning and mutual action plans. - Navigate complex negotiations and commercial discussions while maintaining strong customer relationships. - Build internal and external champions capable of influencing enterprise purchasing decisions. - Demonstrate the judgement to qualify out opportunities where genuine customer value or a viable purchasing path cannot be established. We want a seller who knows how to win when the customer already has a solution, not someone who only succeeds when there is no competition. **Industry Knowledge & Technical Credibility:** This role requires a strong understanding of the market in which Sonatype operates. You should be comfortable discussing how modern enterprise organisations develop, secure and deploy software, and how AI is changing the speed and complexity of those processes. **You will:** - Understand the commercial and technical challenges associated with open source software, software composition analysis, DevSecOps and application security. - Engage confidently with technical and executive buyers around software supply chain risk, developer productivity, governance and security. - Position Sonatype's platform capabilities across Nexus Repository, Firewall, Lifecycle and related solutions. - Understand how software supply chain intelligence can help organisations identify vulnerable components, prevent malicious packages entering development and make better risk decisions. - Translate technical capabilities into measurable business outcomes rather than relying on feature-led selling. - Recognise opportunities to position Sonatype as a strategic enterprise platform rather than a standalone point solution. - Stay informed about emerging technology, AI-assisted development, competitive market movements and evolving enterprise security requirements. **Channel & Cross-Functional Enterprise Selling:** Enterprise sales success requires the ability to bring the right expertise together around the customer. You will: - Build productive relationships with regional channel partners, systems integrators and enterprise solution providers. - Identify partner-sourced and partner-influenced opportunities that support new-logo acquisition. - Collaborate with Sales Engineering to develop effective technical validation strategies and proofs of value. - Partner with Marketing on account-based campaigns, executive engagement and targeted enterprise outreach. - Engage executive sponsors where appropriate to support strategic opportunities. - Coordinate internal resources effectively while retaining clear ownership of the commercial outcome. - Share competitive intelligence, customer insights and market feedback to improve Sonatype's broader enterprise go-to-market execution. **Role Outcomes:** Success in this role means establishing a high-performing, predictable new-logo acquisition engine across the assigned territory. You will be expected to: - Deliver against an annual new-business quota. - Consistently originate and close new enterprise customer opportunities. - Build a sustainable, self-generated enterprise pipeline. - Win strategically important competitive displacement opportunities. - Establish relationships with senior technology and security decision-makers across priority accounts. - Increase Sonatype's presence within major enterprise organisations. - Demonstrate strong enterprise deal qualification, commercial judgement and forecast accuracy. - Build effective relationships with Sales Engineering, Marketing and Channel partners. - Create repeatable territory development and enterprise acquisition practices that support long-term growth. **What Success Looks Like:** **First 30 Days — Understand, Assess & Prioritise** You will develop a deep understanding of Sonatype's technology, competitive positioning, customer value proposition and enterprise go-to-market strategy. You will assess your assigned territory, identify priority accounts, evaluate competitive incumbents and develop relationships with the wider Sales, Sales Engineering, Marketing and Channel teams. You will begin building an evidence-based view of where the strongest new-logo opportunities exist. **First 60 Days — Build the Acquisition Strategy** You will have developed a prioritised territory plan, identifying target accounts, executive stakeholders, competitive displacement opportunities and clear outbound engagement strategies. You will be actively building relationships with prospective customers, generating qualified pipeline and coordinating account-based activity with the wider go-to-market organisation. Your opportunities will reflect clear customer challenges, credible buying processes and measurable business value. **First 90 Days — Demonstrate Commercial Momentum** You will be independently driving enterprise pursuits, demonstrating meaningful self-generated pipeline creation and establishing relationships with key decision-makers. You will be progressing opportunities through technical validation, commercial discovery and structured enterprise qualification. Your territory plan, pipeline coverage and forecasting will provide leadership with confidence in your approach to delivering against quota. **First 12 Months — Deliver High Performance** You will have established a sustainable enterprise acquisition engine and demonstrated the ability to deliver against a quota circa $1.5-2m. You will have acquired new enterprise customers, progressed competitive displacement opportunities and built a strong forward-looking pipeline. You will be recognised for your commercial judgement, proactive hunting mentality, enterprise customer credibility and ability to win complex opportunities. **Who You Are:** You are an accomplished enterprise technology sales professional with a demonstrable track record of acquiring new customers, exceeding ambitious revenue targets and winning in highly competitive markets. You are a hunter by nature, motivated by opening doors, creating opportunities and winning business that would otherwise remain with a competitor. Essential Experience & Capabilities **Proven Enterprise New-Business Performance** - Demonstrated success carrying and achieving substantial enterprise new-business quotas, ideally around $2 million annually or at a comparable level of commercial complexity. - A track record of consistent quota attainment and strong new-logo acquisition. - Evidence of personally originating, developing and closing complex enterprise opportunities. - Ability to quantify pipeline creation, average contract values, competitive wins and revenue performance. **Consistent High Performance** - A history of operating among the strongest performers within your sales organisation. - President's Club, Pinnacle Club or equivalent recognition is particularly attractive. - Evidence of sustained performance across multiple sales periods, rather than reliance on one exceptional transaction or favourable territory. **Competitive Enterprise Selling** - Proven experience winning business against established technology providers. - Ability to develop differentiated competitive strategies and challenge incumbent solutions. - Strong negotiation, executive engagement and commercial deal leadership skills. **Enterprise Territory Development** - Experience developing a geographic or named-account territory through proactive outbound activity. - Strong account prioritisation, stakeholder mapping and territory planning. - Ability to generate your own pipeline rather than relying predominantly on inbound demand. **Technical & Industry Understanding** - Strong familiarity with cybersecurity, DevSecOps, application security, developer tooling, cloud infrastructure or adjacent enterprise technology. - Confidence engaging technical and executive stakeholders in complex buying environments. - Ability to translate sophisticated technical capabilities into clear commercial value. **Sales Methodology & Commercial Discipline** - Experience applying structured enterprise qualification methodologies such as MEDDPICC. - Strong forecasting, opportunity management and pipeline discipline. - Ability to manage complex enterprise opportunities involving multiple stakeholders, technical evaluations and procurement processes. **Preferred Experience:** We would particularly welcome candidates with experience from: - Software supply chain security and software composition analysis. - Application security and DevSecOps platforms. - Repository management and developer infrastructure. - Enterprise cybersecurity and cloud-native security. - Enterprise platform selling and competitive displacement. - Global 2000, Fortune 500 or similarly complex enterprise customers. - Working with channel partners and enterprise systems integrators. - Selling across the technology and enterprise ecosystem. - Consumption-based, platform-led or land-and-expand commercial models.