Head of Pre-Sales

About the role

The is accountable for owning the technical sales motion for the company's Data Feed Products, which represent a new and critical revenue line within the broader API and Private 9fin offerings. This is a build role where the incumbent designs the entire technical sales function, defining the standards, hiring strategy, and operational cadence from the ground up. You will personally lead the technical discovery, validation, and solution design for the first ten to twenty API opportunities, acting as both the strategic owner and the hands-on player in early deals. The role requires you to translate complex technical requirements into scalable sales processes, ensuring that the platform's deep credit data and analysis are positioned clearly for CTOs, CIOs, and engineering leaders. Over time, the position evolves from individual contributor to building and coaching a dedicated team of Product Specialists and enabling functions across the US and EU. Success is measured by your ability to close high-stakes deals quickly and then codify that playbook so the motion can be repeated reliably without your direct involvement in every conversation. You will partner closely with the newly created Customer Partnerships role to align commercial and technical outcomes, shaping how 9fin engages with its largest and most sophisticated financial clients.

Key facts

What you'll do

Partner with EMEA and US Sales as the technical owner on every Data Feed Products opportunity, from first technical conversation to signed contract and go-live handover.

Run technical discovery with CTOs, Heads of Data, Quants and Engineering Leaders. Map the buyer's stack, data flows, latency tolerance, licensing model and integration constraints.

Design and run technical validation - sandbox access, sample pulls, notebook walkthroughs, PoC plans and integration timelines and create a scalable process to close validation in weeks, not months.

Facilitate architecture conversations across the technical stack we sell into: REST, streaming (WebSocket, Kafka), bulk file (S3, SFTP), Snowflake / data share, AWS PrivateLink, authentication(OAuth2, mTLS, API keys), rate limits, schema versioning, entitlements.

Share ownership of the InfoSec, procurement and vendor onboarding work stream and pre-empt the questions Tier 1 buyers will ask.

Codify the technical validation playbook; use case library, reference architectures, sample notebooks, RFI/RFP response templates, objection handling - so the motion is scalable and repeatable.

Hire, onboard and coach the founding Product Specialist team (US and EU), the Sales Enablement Manager and Client Onboarding & Implementation Managers. Set the bar for what good looks like.

Run the closed loop with Product and Engineering. Field objections, schema gaps and integration friction land with the roadmap clearly enough that the next release closes them.

Define and own the operating cadence - deal reviews, pipeline reviews, forecasting, risk escalation and stakeholder reporting.

Own the end-to-end experience for key accounts, ensuring that procurement, legal, security and technology teams move efficiently through the validation and onboarding journey.

Build and communicate a clear, defensible position against alternative data sources and internal build options, emphasizing time-to-value, reliability and governance.

Champion the 9fin platform narrative in every external discussion, aligning stakeholders on vision, risk and long-term partnership.

Track and report on leading and lagging indicators for the API motion, including cycle time, win rate, and adoption metrics, and iterate on the approach based on evidence.

Act as the senior technical voice in negotiations, ensuring that commercial terms reflect the complexity and risk of integrations across cloud, data and authentication layers.

Requirements

You must have a proven track record in pre-sales, solutions architecture, or technical sales within data, fintech, or infrastructure software, with a history of selling complex APIs and data products to enterprise clients.

You must have deep experience working with financial services buyers, including asset managers, banks, private equity, law firms and advisors, and understand the regulatory and operational constraints that shape their technology decisions.

You must have hands-on experience with modern data stack components such as REST APIs, streaming protocols like WebSocket or Kafka, bulk data transfer mechanisms including S3 and SFTP, and data warehouse integrations such as Snowflake.

You must be comfortable working with authentication and security models including OAuth2, mTLS, and API keys, and understand how these are evaluated in enterprise procurement and compliance reviews.

You must have strong experience in defining and running technical proof-of-concept exercises, with the ability to translate business requirements into technical tests and evaluation criteria.

You must have a demonstrated ability to operate at the intersection of business, technology and compliance, translating between these domains without losing rigor or clarity.

You must have excellent written and verbal communication skills, with a track record of presenting complex technical concepts clearly to both technical and non-technical audiences.

You must be comfortable managing multiple, concurrent technical workstreams under tight deadlines and delivering structured, accountable outcomes in a fast-moving sales environment.

Nice to have

Experience hiring, onboarding and managing senior technical sales and enablement professionals in a SaaS or data-intensive environment.

A background in building and scaling API products or platform businesses, with familiarity with product-led growth motions and developer experience.

Practical notes

Full-time commitment based in London.

Candidates should be prepared for significant hands-on work during the first six months, transitioning into a leadership and coaching role from month six onward.

This role requires frequent collaboration across product, engineering, legal, compliance and sales operations, often under tight timelines.