Director of Strategic Partnerships & Channel Development

Contextere | Blue Collar AI
Location: Ottawa, Canada
Department: Sales & Marketing
Status: Full-time
Reports To: CEO

About Contextere

Contextere is an Ottawa-based AI company helping industrial and defence organizations transform operational data into actionable intelligence. Our technology empowers technicians, operators, maintainers, and leaders with AI-driven insights that improve decision-making, increase workforce readiness, and reduce operational risk.

We work with global organizations including defence agencies, aerospace leaders, transportation providers, and industrial enterprises to deploy practical AI solutions that deliver measurable operational impact. As demand for our platform grows, we are seeking a Director, Strategic Partnerships & Channel Development to help expand Contextere's strategic partner ecosystem and market access.

Director, Strategic Partnerships & Channel Development

Contextere is seeking a Director, Strategic Partnerships & Channel Development to expand strategic partnerships, build channel pathways, improve access to government procurement vehicles, and establish the commercial infrastructure required to support the company's next stage of growth. This role is ideal for a commercially minded operator who can translate strategic relationships into repeatable market access, qualified pipeline, and measurable revenue impact.

In this role, the Director will be responsible for expanding Contextere's partner ecosystem across defence, aerospace, industrial, transportation, and public-sector markets. The successful candidate will combine strategic business development experience with strong operational discipline, contract management capability, and an understanding of the security and compliance requirements associated with enterprise and government customers.

Role Overview

As Director, Strategic Partnerships & Channel Development, you will create the partner-led growth engine for Contextere. You will identify and develop strategic alliances, OEM relationships, government contract pathways, and ecosystem opportunities that accelerate adoption of Contextere's AI solutions across industrial industry.

The role requires a blend of strategic relationship building, enterprise sales discipline, deal support, procurement fluency, and cross-functional collaboration. You will work closely with leadership, sales, product, delivery, marketing, and customer-facing teams.

Who You Are

• You are a strategic business development leader who understands how partnerships, channels, and procurement pathways can accelerate enterprise technology adoption.

• You are comfortable engaging senior stakeholders across defence, aerospace, industrial, transportation, and public-sector environments.

• You can move fluidly between strategy and execution: building market narratives, structuring partner plans, supporting bids, and tracking commercial outcomes.

• You bring operational discipline to relationship-driven work and know how to convert conversations into opportunities, agreements, and revenue-producing activity.

• You are energized by category creation and want to help scale a Canadian AI company focused on practical AI for the frontline workforce.

Key Responsibilities

• Strategic Account and Deal Support: Collaborate with sales, product, and delivery teams to support complex enterprise pursuits, including partner-led opportunities, customer briefings, solution positioning, and executive-level engagement.

• Pipeline and Revenue Growth: Establish mechanisms to identify, track, report, and advance partner-generated opportunities, pipeline, deal progression, and revenue contribution.

• Government Procurement Access: Identify, qualify, and support procurement vehicles, contracting pathways, innovation programs, and compliance requirements that improve access to defence, public-sector, and regulated enterprise customers.

• Pricing, Value Proposition & ROI: Develop and communicate compelling pricing models, value propositions, and ROI narratives that help partners and customers understand the measurable business impact of Contextere's solutions.

• Proposal and Bid Support: Support RFP responses, proposals, innovation challenges, strategic bids, and partner submissions aligned with Contextere's growth objectives.

• Channel Enablement: Create and maintain partner-facing materials, playbooks, messaging, training content, and engagement processes that enable partners to represent Contextere effectively. Design repeatable channel motions, partner tiers, engagement models, enablement activities, and joint go-to-market plans that increase Contextere's reach and market access.

• Market Representation: Represent Contextere in industry associations, partner meetings, conferences, trade missions, customer briefings, and strategic ecosystem engagements.

Preferred Qualifications

The ideal candidate brings experience building partner ecosystems, channel programs, or strategic alliances in enterprise technology, defence, aerospace, industrial, transportation, or public-sector markets. They understand how complex organizations buy technology, how partners influence enterprise adoption, and how procurement pathways, contracting mechanisms, and compliance requirements shape commercial success.

This is a senior, cross-functional role suited to a candidate who is commercially oriented, operationally disciplined, and comfortable working with enterprise customers, government stakeholders, strategic partners, and technical teams.

Required Experience and Capabilities

• Demonstrated experience in strategic partnerships, channel development, enterprise business development, public-sector sales, or ecosystem growth.

• Strong understanding of enterprise technology sales cycles, partner-led selling motions, and complex stakeholder management.

• Experience working with or selling into defence, aerospace, industrial, transportation, government, or other regulated markets.

• Ability to develop partner business plans, joint value propositions, opportunity maps, and structured account engagement strategies.

• Familiarity with government procurement vehicles, contracting pathways, RFP processes, innovation programs, and compliance considerations.

• Strong commercial judgment, including the ability to connect partner activity to qualified pipeline, customer value, and revenue outcomes.

• Excellent communication skills, including the ability to brief executives, represent the company externally, and translate technical capabilities into business value.

• Comfort working in a scale-up environment where priorities evolve quickly and execution requires ownership, initiative, and collaboration.

Nice to Have

• Existing relationships within defence, aerospace, transportation, infrastructure, manufacturing, or industrial technology ecosystems.

• Experience working with systems integrators, OEMs, prime contractors, technology alliances, or channel partner programs.

• Knowledge of AI, industrial software, operational technology, workforce enablement, maintenance, training, or mission readiness solutions.

• Experience supporting Canadian, U.S., NATO, or allied defence and public-sector market development.

• Experience building partner programs, enablement materials, reseller models, co-sell motions, or joint market development plans from the ground up.

What Success Looks Like

Success in this role will be measured by the quality and commercial relevance of the partner ecosystem you build, the clarity of the channel strategy you establish, the strength of partner-generated opportunities, and the degree to which Contextere gains better access to target customers, procurement pathways, and strategic markets.

Success Measures

Within the first 12 months, the successful candidate will be expected to demonstrate measurable progress in the following areas:

• Expansion of strategic partner relationships and distribution pathways in priority markets.

• Clear partner segmentation, engagement model, and joint go-to-market process.

• Improved access to relevant government procurement vehicles, contracting mechanisms, and public-sector growth pathways.

• Growth in partner-generated pipeline, qualified opportunities, and revenue contribution.

• Stronger visibility for Contextere within defence, aerospace, transportation, and industrial ecosystems.

Why Join Contextere?

At Contextere, you will not just help sell technology — you will help put practical AI into the hands of the people who keep critical operations moving. This is an opportunity to work at the intersection of industrial innovation, national security, and frontline workforce transformation.

• Shape the future of AI for the technicians, operators, maintainers, and mission teams who power the physical world.

• Work directly with the CEO and leadership team in a high-trust, high-visibility role where your ideas and customer insights will matter.

• Engage with world-class defence, aerospace, transportation, and industrial organizations solving real operational problems.

• Influence both product direction and customer success by turning field-level realities into scalable AI capabilities.

• Join a Canadian AI company at a pivotal growth stage, with the opportunity to help define a category and build lasting enterprise value.

• Make a measurable impact in a role that blends technical depth, customer leadership, and meaningful career growth.

• Be part of a team building practical AI products for customers operating in complex, mission-critical environments.

How to Apply

If you are excited by the opportunity to help scale a Canadian AI company, build strategic partnerships, and bring practical AI to the people and organizations that keep critical operations moving, we would like to hear from you.

Please submit your resume and a brief note outlining your experience with partnerships, channel development, enterprise technology, or regulated-market growth.