Business Development Lead

About Caliza

Caliza is commercial banking infrastructure for companies that operate across borders. Most global businesses still piece together several banks, FX providers and spreadsheets to move money. Caliza replaces that with one platform and API: hold USD accounts, collect and pay in 33+ currencies, and convert between fiat and stablecoins, over local rails, SWIFT or stablecoins, in minutes instead of days. On top of that, we’re building the treasury layer: programmable accounts, approval policies, automated reconciliation and working capital, run by a customer’s finance team or their AI agents.

Our customers are importers, exporters, FX brokers, payment companies and fintechs across the Americas, Europe, Africa and Asia. We’re licensed and regulated across our core markets, and our team has built financial infrastructure at Visa, Nubank, EBANX, Flutterwave, Upstart, Intuit and Silicon Valley Bank.

Our backers

Initialized Capital, Better Tomorrow Ventures, Abstract Ventures, New Form Capital, QED Investors, Valor Capital and Quona Capital, along with the founders of Flutterwave, Chipper Cash, Rappi, Pomelo, Dock, Remesa Online and Anchorage.

About the role

You will launch and grow Caliza's business across Africa, starting in Nigeria. You will own the regional revenue target, build the pipeline from day one, and close the PSPs, fintechs, remittance companies, and trade businesses that move money between Africa, the US, Latin America, and Asia. You will report to the Director of Business Development, work closely with the CEO, and partner with Compliance, Product, Legal, and Operations to get customers live quickly and safely.

What you'll do

• Own the Africa territory. Core market: Nigeria. Expansion markets: Ghana, Kenya and South Africa. Key corridors: Africa–US, Africa–China, Africa–Europe and Africa–Latin America.
• Prioritise these target customers in each market:
• Nigeria: licensed PSPs, fintechs and remittance companies, plus importers paying suppliers in China, the US and Europe who need reliable USD access.
• Ghana: mobile-money operators, remittance companies and PSPs handling diaspora inflows and trade payments.
• Kenya: mobile-money and remittance players, fintechs and exporters connecting East Africa to global markets.
• South Africa: fintechs, crypto-asset service providers and exporters looking for faster cross-border settlement.
• Sell USD collections, fiat–stablecoin on/off-ramps, named USD virtual accounts and global payouts across the territory.
• Qualify licensing and compliance requirements early with our Compliance team so customers onboard quickly and safely.
• Develop relationships with local banks, PSPs and liquidity providers that strengthen Caliza's African corridors.
• Use your network to source, qualify, and close new revenue-generating customers, and run full sales cycles from discovery through pricing, contract, onboarding, and first live transactions.
• Negotiate commercial terms, including bps pricing, FX spreads, and volume tiers, and present with confidence using existing templates.
• Keep pipeline, activity, and forecasts accurate in HubSpot, and track metrics such as pipeline coverage, win rate, time to first transaction, and monthly volume.
• Work with Customer Success, Operations, and Compliance to ensure smooth handoffs, and share prospect feedback to help refine the sales process.

What you'll bring

• 10+ years in sales or business development at a fintech, payments company, crypto business, or bank, ideally in Nigeria or across Africa.
• Experience selling to licensed PSPs, fintechs, mobile-money operators, remittance and trade-payment companies, and international businesses, with a track record of hitting quota across the full sales cycle.
• An existing relationship base with senior professionals in African fintech, payments or crypto, such as licensed PSPs, remittance companies and trade-payment operators.
• A clear understanding of the value stablecoins and blockchain bring to cross-border payments.
• A data-driven approach, strong negotiation and presentation skills, and excellent follow-through that never lets an opportunity slip.
• Comfort working in a fast-paced, resource-constrained startup and adapting your approach to local business cultures.
• Professional working fluency in English.
• Based in, or within two hours of, Lagos, with the ability to overlap a few hours a day with US Eastern and Brazil time zones.

Nice to have

• Prior startup experience.
• Deep understanding of the African fintech and crypto landscape and relevant regulations (e.g., CBN, SEC Nigeria, CBK, SARB/FSCA) as they relate to closing prospects.
• Experience with HubSpot, Slack, Notion, Google Workspace, and modern AI tools (e.g. Claude).

Benefits

Benefits vary by country of employment and may include health coverage, paid time off and holidays, a home office or equipment allowance, a professional development budget, and in-person team offsites. Candidates based outside the US may be employed through an employer of record or engaged as contractors, with pay and benefits structured to local law and market practice.

Equal opportunity and other disclosures

Equal opportunity employer. Caliza is an equal opportunity employer. We make employment decisions without regard to race, color, religion, creed, sex, pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, age, physical or mental disability, medical condition, genetic information, marital or family status, military or veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law. We value diverse backgrounds and encourage you to apply even if you don’t meet every listed qualification.

Accommodations. We provide reasonable accommodations to qualified applicants with disabilities and to anyone who needs one during the hiring process. To request an accommodation, contact the recruiting team.

Background screening. Because we handle sensitive financial data and regulated activity, any offer will be contingent on a background check, which may include criminal history, employment and education verification, and sanctions screening, to the extent permitted by law. In the US, we conduct screening in line with the Fair Credit Reporting Act and applicable state and local fair chance laws, and we consider qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records in accordance with those laws.

Work authorization. Candidates must be authorized to work in their country of residence. We are not able to sponsor visas for this role.

Employment terms. For US-based hires, employment with Caliza is at-will. Terms for hires outside the US follow local law.

Applicant privacy. We collect and process applicant personal data solely for purposes of evaluating applications and managing the recruitment process in accordance with applicable data protection laws, including the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), Brazil’s General Data Protection Law (LGPD), Mexico’s Federal Law on the Protection of Personal Data Held by Private Parties (LFPDPPP), the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), and the Nigeria Data Protection Act 2023 (NDPA). We retain personal data only for as long as necessary for these purposes or as required by applicable law. Subject to applicable legal requirements, applicants may request access to, correction or deletion of their personal data, as well as exercise other applicable rights, including restricting or objecting to processing and requesting data portability.

Use of AI in hiring. We may use AI tools to support parts of the hiring process, such as reviewing applications or assessing responses. These tools assist our team but do not replace human judgment, and final hiring decisions are made by people.

Recruitment fraud. Caliza will never ask candidates for payment, banking details, or cryptocurrency during the hiring process. Official communications come only from Caliza email addresses. If you receive a suspicious message claiming to be from us, please report it to our team.