Private Equity Partnerships Lead

About Hyphenate

Most AI companies in finance are building copilots. Hyphenate builds AI agents that do the work.

Hyphenate is the autonomous finance platform for the office of the CFO. Our agents run on top of a company's existing ERP, banks, billing, CRM and contracts, and take on the work itself: order-to-cash and revenue recognition, cash and treasury, procure-to-pay, general ledger and close, and reporting. They learn how each company runs finance, log every action for auditors, and escalation the decisions that need human judgment. No ERP migration, no rip-and-replace.

We are based in New York City and backed by a $9M seed round led by Foundation Capital, with BoldCap, Gaia Ventures, Aravind Srinivas (CEO of Perplexity) and finance leaders from Zuora, Ramp, Gusto, MongoDB, Zoom and the Big Four. Customers include Kiteworks, HiBid, Dura Software, Mini Melts and Rently. The average customer runs six modules, and 40% expand within their first contract year.

About the Role

We are hiring a Private Equity Partnerships Lead to build our PE channel from zero to one.

Private equity has become our strongest pull. PE-backed companies are over-represented in our customer base, and the same pattern keeps repeating: we deploy at one portfolio company, the operating partner hears about it, and they come to us asking how to roll Hyphenate out across the portfolio. So far that has happened organically, with the channel shared between our CRO, CEO and Chief of Staff. This role exists so that one person owns it and makes it happen on purpose.

This is a true business development role, not a closing role. You will own our relationships with PE firms, especially operating partners and portfolio value-creation teams, and turn them into a repeatable source of warm, qualified pipeline for our Account Executives. You are measured on closed ARR that you sourced.

You start as an individual contributor and the first hire on this channel. The mandate is to bring the relationships, build the playbook, and prove it works before we add a team around it. You report to the Chief Revenue Officer, who has launched and run partnerships at FloQast and Trovata, and you will work directly with our CEO, who has personally driven much of our PE traction to date.

What You'll Own

• Build the PE channel from 0 to 1: the target firm list, the outreach motion, the partner value proposition, and the handoff into sales

• Open and own relationships with operating partners, portfolio operations, value creation and finance leaders at the top 50 to 100 PE firms investing in our segments: B2B software, CPG, manufacturing, wholesale distribution, and multi-entity roll-ups

• Turn firm relationships into pipeline: map each sponsor's portfolio, identify the companies with the finance complexity we solve, and source warm introductions to their CFOs and Controllers

• Run the partner funnel and report on it weekly: firms engaged, portfolio companies introduced, meetings sourced, and closed ARR

• Design and test an operating-partner motion: packaged multi-portco deployments that a sponsor can prioritize and roll out across its portfolio

• Convert customer wins into sponsor relationships: work with our customer and solutions teams to turn a happy portfolio company into a portfolio-wide conversation

• Be present in the PE ecosystem: operating partner forums, events, dinners, and the advisory and consulting firms that sit around PE

• Partner with Account Executives on every sourced deal from intro through close, and with Marketing on PE-specific content, case studies and events

• Bring the market back inside: which firms convert, what operating partners care about, and what the product needs for portfolio-wide deployment

What You Should Have Done Before

• Worked in, sold to, or partnered with private equity. You know the PE landscape and have existing relationships with operating partners, portfolio operations or deal teams at mid-market and upper mid-market firms

• Built a partnership or channel from scratch in B2B tech, ideally in fintech, accounting, finance or ERP-adjacent software

• Have a playbook you can walk us through for operationalizing a partner funnel with PE firms: how you get in, who you talk to, how you source introductions, and how you track it

• Carried a sourced pipeline or revenue number and hit it

• Comfortable owning a channel end to end as an individual contributor, with CRO and founder support but no team under you yet

• Based in New York City or willing to relocate; we work from our Manhattan office

• High agency and high ownership. You run this every day without being asked

You’ll Stand Out If

• You have been an operating partner, worked in portfolio operations at a PE firm, or been a finance operator inside a PE-backed company

• You hold a CPA or have accounting, audit or FP&A experience, and can talk credibly with a Controller about close, revenue recognition or cash

• You have led PE or VC partnerships at a finance software company (ERP, close, FP&A, billing, spend management) and have relationships you can reactivate on day one

• You have B2B fintech partnership exposure beyond PE: accounting advisory firms, ERPs, or systems integrators

• You have built something from 0 to 1 at an early-stage startup

What Great Looks Like Here

• You treat operating partners as customers in their own right. You know what they are measured on and can show them how finance automation moves portfolio EBITDA and exit readiness

• You are a builder, not a relationship manager. Managing an existing book is not the job; creating one is

• You are comfortable being measured on sourced ARR, and you like that the number is unambiguous

• You have strong opinions about how AI will change finance in PE-backed companies, and you can hold your own with a CFO

The Upside

• Own a channel, not a territory. You build the PE motion for a company where the demand already exists, with a direct line to the CRO and CEO

• $180K to $220K base salary, commission tied to the closed ARR you source, and meaningful equity

• Medical, dental and vision coverage for you and your dependents, and a 401(k) match

• Meals and a stocked office in Manhattan, with a move to a new downtown space planned for early 2027

• A seat at the table as we define a new category: autonomous finance

Location and Interview Process

This role is based in New York City. The team works from our Manhattan office five days a week, with flexibility for the right person.

Our process moves quickly, usually within two weeks:

1. 30-minute intro with our CRO

2. Deep dive on your PE playbook: the firms you know, how you got in, and how you would stand up our channel

3. Conversation with our CEO

4. Final round: present a 30/60/90-day plan for the PE channel to the leadership team