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Lightning Labs is seeking a Business Development Lead to drive go-to-market strategy, monetization, and enterprise sales for the Lightning Network, a Bitcoin layer-2 protocol. The role focuses on expanding Lightning's reach across enterprise, fintech, payments, AI, and merchant ecosystems by translating technical capabilities into concrete business outcomes.
Key Responsibilities:
Strategy & OKRs: Set and own high-level BD objectives across target regions, verticals, and segments. Identify the most promising use cases and companies for Lightning, agentic payments, and stablecoins. Prioritize accounts and partners with the highest network growth potential. Collaborate with product and engineering on roadmap priorities based on customer and developer feedback.
Monetization and Sales: Design pricing, packaging, and deal structures aligned to product value (volume-based, tiered, usage-based, partner revenue shares). Personally lead and close strategic, multi-stakeholder deals with exchanges, AI companies, payment service providers, wallets, fintechs, miners, and enterprise adopters. Establish a lightweight forecast and pipeline cadence with Finance, balancing rigor with team culture.
Developer Community and Market Development: Source and prioritize net-new partners and channels. Develop joint go-to-market strategies with key ecosystem players (processors, liquidity providers, compliance vendors, custody, infrastructure). Architect distribution flywheels connecting developer adoption, merchant enablement, and payment volume. Connect customers' business goals with technical integrations, integration partners, and liquidity resources.
Executive Communications: Craft executive-ready materials (narratives, pitch decks, RFPs, board/partner updates) that tie Lightning's capabilities to business impact. Represent Lightning Labs at senior-level meetings, conferences, and media/analyst engagements. Contribute thought leadership that advances the category.
The role is fully remote and global, with a requirement to work on US time zones and willingness to travel for key customers and events.
Requirements:
- 7–10+ years in business development, strategic partnerships, and/or solution-oriented enterprise sales at a fintech, payments, AI, or other relevant tech company
- Demonstrated track record of crafting go-to-market strategy and closing complex, multi-party commercial agreements
- Strong technical and product fluency: able to translate Bitcoin/Lightning concepts (routing, liquidity, settlement, Taproot Assets/stablecoins, agentic payments) into clear commercial outcomes
- Fluency with frontier large language models and AI tools; willingness to integrate them at every level
- Comfortable leading a small team and operating as a senior individual contributor
- Exceptional written and verbal communication; confident with C-suite, product, legal, and technical stakeholders
- Analytical, data-driven decision-maker; comfortable building ROI/TCO models and deal economics
- Ability to work autonomously across time zones; willing to travel for key customers and events
Preferred:
- Public writings or talks on global payments, Bitcoin/Lightning, AI, or stablecoins
- Deep network among exchanges, AI companies, payment service providers, wallets, fintechs, and payment facilitators—especially in LATAM, Asia, or Sub-Saharan Africa
- Experience launching or scaling developer-led distribution and partner channels
- Familiarity with compliance considerations in crypto/payments and how they affect go-to-market strategy
