Channel Sales Executive at Canonical - Open Source Career in Columbus
Career & Market Insight
Career trajectory: This is a mid-to-senior individual contributor channel sales role reporting to the APAC Director. It sits at a sweet spot for sales professionals who want to own a territory fully — combining partner recruitment (hunting) with account growth (farming). Success here opens paths to regional sales management or global channel leadership at Canonical.
Skills developed: You'll sharpen expertise in:
- Open source and cloud GTM strategy (high-demand in enterprise software)
- Channel partner lifecycle management — from recruitment to enablement to revenue generation
- Cross-cultural enterprise sales in the Japanese market, a notoriously relationship-driven environment
Compensation signals: No explicit figures are posted, but Canonical's geo-adjusted pay model typically lands below top-tier US tech benchmarks but competitive for Japan-based roles. The performance-driven commission component rewards top performers meaningfully.
Green flags: Canonical has been profitable and founder-led since 2004 — rare stability for a tech firm of this size. The Ubuntu brand carries genuine recognition in enterprise IT, giving you a credible product to sell. The L&D budget and annual review culture suggest investment in people.
Yellow flags: The "unstructured, startup-like environment" language is candid — if you need process-heavy support structures, this may frustrate. Japan's enterprise sales cycles are long and relationship-intensive, requiring patience and cultural fluency. Fluency in Japanese is not explicitly listed as a requirement — clarify this before applying, as it is almost certainly essential for day-to-day partner interactions.
Canonical is a leading provider of open source software and operating systems to the global enterprise and technology markets. Our platform, Ubuntu, is very widely used in breakthrough enterprise initiatives such as public cloud, data science, AI, engineering innovation, and IoT. Our customers include the world's leading public cloud and silicon providers, and industry leaders in many sectors. The company is a pioneer of global distributed collaboration, with 1200+ colleagues in 75+ countries and very few office-based roles. Teams meet two to four times yearly in person, in interesting locations around the world, to align on strategy and execution.
The company is founder-led, profitable, and growing.
Canonical is growing its channel sales team to capitalize on rapidly growing demand from channel partners, leveraging their expertise and connections to bring open source technology to organizations across a multitude of industries.
The Channel Partner Sales Executive, Japan role reports to the Director, APAC Channel Sales and requires a mix of both farming and hunting capabilities. The successful candidate will be responsible for achieving assigned annual growth quotas.
They should be able to identify, prospect, and engage reseller and distributor partners to build and maintain relationships and grow Canonical's business within the assigned territory.
The successful candidate must be comfortable owning and leading initiatives in an unstructured, startup-like environment. This individual must be able to sell open source, cloud, virtualization, and technical software solutions.
Although the role is focused primarily on reseller and distributor channel partners, the successful candidate must be capable of and comfortable with initial customer discovery calls and presentations as appropriate.
Location: Japan
The Role Entails
- Develop and execute channel strategy for distributors and resellers within the assigned territory
- Increase awareness of Canonical as a lead player in Open Source and Cloud (Private, Hybrid, Multi, and Public models)
- Identify and recruit new potential partners in assigned territory
- Leverage personal network and prospecting skills to engage new partners and build on Canonical's already-successful relationships
- Guide partners through onboarding and enablement
- Develop mutually beneficial go-to-market plans and commitments with partners
- Arrange and execute sales and pre-sales trainings to these resellers
- Drive and manage channel pipeline through recurring partner interactions
- Support partner satisfaction and act as trusted advisor and point of contact
- Maintain regularity/frequency of contact with priority resellers and distributors
What We Are Looking For in You
- Bachelor's level degree, preferably in a technology field
- Experience in software or technology sales from the specified market
- Fluency in English
- An understanding of open source, Linux and Ubuntu
- A self-starter with a proven track record of achieving sales targets
- Detail oriented with strong follow-up skills
- Effective negotiating skills with ability to close sales
- Excellent interpersonal and presentation skills (written and verbal)
- Productive in a globally distributed team through self-discipline and self-motivation
- Mature approach to long-term relationship development with customers
- The ability to represent the company at external events
- Start-up experience would be an advantage
What We Offer Colleagues
We consider geographical location, experience, and performance in shaping compensation worldwide. We revisit compensation annually (and more often for graduates and associates) to ensure we recognise outstanding performance. In addition to base pay, we offer a performance-driven annual bonus or commission. We provide all team members with additional benefits, which reflect our values and ideals. We balance our programs to meet local needs and ensure fairness globally.
- Distributed work environment with twice-yearly team sprints in person
- Personal learning and development budget of USD 2,000 per year
- Annual compensation review
- Recognition rewards
- Annual holiday leave
- Maternity and paternity leave
- Employee Assistance Programme
- Opportunity to travel to new locations to meet colleagues
- Priority Pass and travel upgrades for long haul company events
About Canonical
Canonical is a pioneering tech firm at the forefront of the global move to open source. As the company that publishes Ubuntu, one of the most important open source projects and the platform for AI, IoT and the cloud, we are changing the world of software. We recruit on a global basis and set a very high standard for people joining the company. We expect excellence — in order to succeed, we need to be the best at what we do. Most colleagues at Canonical have worked from home since its inception in 2004. Working here is a step into the future, and will challenge you to think differently, work smarter, learn new skills, and raise your game.
Canonical is an equal opportunity employer
We are proud to foster a workplace free from discrimination. Diversity of experience, perspectives, and background create a better work environment and better products. Whatever your identity, we will give your application fair consideration.
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