The posting
Company Overview:
We are building Protege to solve the biggest unmet need in AI — getting access to the right training data. The process today is time intensive, incredibly expensive, and often ends in failure. The Protege platform facilitates the secure, efficient, and privacy-centric exchange of AI training data.
Solving AI’s data problem is a generational opportunity. We’re backed by world-class investors and already powering partnerships with some of the most ambitious teams in AI. The company that succeeds will be one of the largest in AI — and in tech.
We’re a lean, fast-moving, high-trust team of builders who are obsessed with velocity and impact. Our culture is built for people who thrive on ambiguity, own outcomes, and want to shape the future of data and AI.
About the Role
The Strategic Account Manager owns one of the most consequential commercial relationships at Protege: th Foundation labs and Frontier AI builders — organizations like OpenAI, Meta, Google, Apple, and Anthropic — that are defining what AI becomes.
This is not a conventional sales role. A SAM's job is not to simply to close a series of unrelated deals. A SAM's job is to engineer high-value relationships and drive unimpeachable value, en route to driving significant GMV for Protege. You are the primary commercial owner of a small number of accounts that represent tens of millions of dollars of annual revenue potential — and the relationships that make Protege's broader business possible.
You will work in close partnership with DataLab researchers, Product Success, and Partnerships to translate complex, multi-modal data needs into real solutions — often before our customers fully know what they need. You understand how foundation models are built, what researchers care about, and how to show up as a trusted partner rather than a vendor. You think in multi-year relationship arcs, not quarterly close dates.
What You'll Do
• Own a portfolio of 2–4 foundation lab or frontier AI accounts end-to-end — from relationship development and deal structuring through contracting, delivery handoff, and expansion.
• Map the full account landscape: identify key researchers, data science leads, procurement stakeholders, and executive sponsors. Understand who influences decisions and who makes them.
• Lead business-level discovery across departments and functions to identify projects and opportunities for Protege to broaden and deepen our penetration of each account
• Coordinate the teams who interact technically with our customer research teams -You’ll work closely with our Solutions and DataLab teams to do so
• Build and maintain a living account plan for each strategic account, including deal chronology, relationship health, 12-month GMV potential, open opportunities, and known risks.
• Orchestrate internal resources — DataLab, Solutions, Partnerships, Legal, Customer Success Manger (CSM) — to deliver on commitments and protect relationship equity. You are the single point of commercial accountability.
• Drive multi-year, multi-modal deal strategy: structure agreements that deepen account relationships over time rather than optimizing for individual transaction size.
• Surface patterns across your accounts that inform Protege's data supply strategy, product roadmap, and go-to-market — you are on the frontier of what the world's best AI labs need next.
• Maintain rigorous deal hygiene: accurate forecasting, clean Deal Desk submissions, documented handoffs to CSM and Product Success at close.
• Represent Protege at field events, research dinners, and conferences where foundation lab relationships are built and deepened.
What Success Looks Like
30 Days — Learn the accounts. Earn the right to lead them.
• Complete deep account briefings on each assigned account: deal history, active relationships, open opportunities, delivery status, and known risks.
• Shadow existing deal conversations, Deal Desk sessions, and DataLab research calls to understand how Protege's internal machine works.
• Establish direct relationships with your primary points of contact at each account — researchers, data leads, and commercial stakeholders.
• Identify the single highest-priority open opportunity in each account and develop a clear point of view on what it will take to close it.
60 Days — Lead the commercial motion. Deepen the relationships.
• Own all commercial conversations in your accounts, with DataLab and Product Success running alongside you — not in front of you.
• Have a credible 90-day pipeline view for each account: committed deals, active opportunities, and what is needed to progress each.
• Complete account plans for each strategic account in the standard format, reviewed with Don and the exec team.
• Identify at least one expansion opportunity per account that did not exist before your arrival — a new data type, a new team, a new use case.
90 Days — Drive GMV. Build the multi-year relationship arc.
• Close or advance at least one material deal in each account. Material means it moves the quarterly number and deepens the relationship.
• Deliver a 90-day account retro for each strategic account: what we learned, what the relationship looks like now versus on day one, what the 12-month opportunity is, and what we need internally to capture it.
• Have a clear point of view on the path to multi-year agreements in at least one account — what it would take, what the unlock is, and when.
• Be the person DataLab researchers want to bring into a room and the person customers ask for by name.
What You Bring
We focus on what you have accomplished, not how long you were in a particular role.
• Proven track record managing and growing large, complex enterprise accounts — preferably with foundation labs, hyperscalers, or frontier AI organizations. You have closed multi-million dollar deals and know what it takes to sustain them.
• Technical fluency sufficient to earn the trust of AI researchers and data scientists. You do not need to be an ML engineer, but you need to understand how models are trained, why data quality and provenance matter, and what de-identification means in practice.
• Demonstrated ability to build relationships at multiple levels of a single organization simultaneously — from working-level researchers to VP and executive sponsors — and to advance deals through complex, multi-stakeholder procurement processes.
• Strong deal architecture skills: you know how to structure agreements that create long-term value, not just close quarters. Experience with multi-year licensing, data access frameworks, or platform agreements is a genuine plus.
• Operational discipline: you run clean pipeline, forecast accurately, and hand off to delivery teams in ways that set them up to succeed rather than scramble.
• High emotional intelligence and judgment in relationship-sensitive situations. Foundation lab accounts require a long game — you know when to push and when to listen, and you never sacrifice trust for a transaction.
• Comfort with ambiguity and fast-moving deal environments. Scope changes, new requirements, and compressed timelines are the norm. You stay organized and calm when others don't.
Protege Values
Pass the Loved Ones’ Test
We act with integrity and do the right thing — especially when it’s hard and no one is watching.
Always Find a Way
We are resourceful, resilient builders who solve hard problems and push through obstacles.
Go Fast and Grow Fast
Velocity matters. We move with urgency, learn quickly, and continuously improve as individuals and as a company.
Practice Kindness and Candor
We communicate directly and respectfully, building trust through honest feedback and genuine care for one another.
Deliver Together
We win as one team. Collaboration, accountability, and shared ownership drive our success.
Own the Outcome. Hone the Craft.
We take pride in our work, sweat the details, and continuously raise the bar for excellence.
