Distributor Business Development Manager - Asia Pacific and Japan

What is The Role

What You Will Be Doing

• Manage business plans with distribution partners. Set quarterly targets for the pipeline and for recruiting resellers. Prioritize segments for Elastic's Enterprise, Public Sector, and Commercial business.
• Build and maintain executive-level relationships with distribution executive team, and drive business growth initiatives with Elastic Field Sales teams, Managed Partners teams, and distributors
• Develop and execute a distribution GTM playbook aligned to Elastic's Fiscal year priorities and key performance indicators such as: partner-sourced pipeline, New & Expansion business targets and reseller coverage model.
• Work with Global Partner Sales Operations to track distributor performance using KPIs. These KPIs include partner-sourced ARR, deal registration volume, pipeline coverage ratio, and reseller activation rates.

• Onsite & Virtual - Independently design and deliver technical enablement programs for reseller sales engineers, architects, and pre-sales teams — onsite at distributor offices, reseller HQs, and industry events, as well as in virtual/webinar formats.
• Build and maintain a reusable enablement content library: demo environments, hands-on lab guides, discovery decks, competitive battle-cards, and certification study aids tailored to the Elastic platform (Search, Observability, Security).
• Run monthly/quarterly distributor enablement days with coordinated technical tracks (observability, SIEM/security analytics, vector/AI search) and business tracks (program updates, incentives, pipeline reviews).
• Drive reseller technical certifications and training completions through proactive cohort scheduling, remediation support, and accountability reporting back to Elastic Partner Enablement.
• Deliver or co-deliver Elastic product demonstrations for reseller-led opportunities, serving as the technical point of contact for pre-sales support through distribution when a dedicated SE is unavailable.

• Identify, recruit, and enable net-new resellers through distribution partners; manage tiering and partner program alignment.
• Drive reseller activation through demand generation programs, MDF utilization, and joint marketing motions with distributors
• Maintain a healthy, active reseller pipeline across APJ markets

• Partner with Elastic Regional Sales field managers (RVPs, AEs) to integrate distribution into account and territory planning.
• Own execution across Elastic account segments - Work with Global Partner Sales Operations & Strategy on distributor discount structures, incentive programs, and data integrity within Salesforce/Impartner.
• Collaborate with Elastic's Marketing team to develop and deploy partner-funded demand generation campaigns through public sector distribution partners.
• Escalate and resolve distributor-facing channel conflicts, pricing disputes, and deal registration exceptions in coordination with Global Partner Sales leadership and Deal Desk.

What You Bring

• 7+ years of channel sales or partner management experience, with at least 3 years focused on distribution.
• Demonstrated track record of driving partner-sourced revenue through distributor-managed reseller ecosystems.
• Proven ability to independently deliver sales pitches and business value proposition to partners, ability to showcase product or solution demos, co-deliver hands-on workshops, and lab-based training — to Sales and technical audiences (SEs, architects, pre-sales).
• Experience building or managing a self-sustaining partner enablement program: content design, delivery cadence, certification tracking, and outcomes measurement.
• Hands-on fluency with at least one of the following domains: observability/monitoring, SIEM/security analytics, log management, or enterprise search — sufficient to lead credible technical conversations and live product walkthroughs.
• Deep familiarity with account segments and how channel partners serve and execute business with Enterprise, Public Sector and commercial customers.
• Experienced with diverse region and working directly with partners based in different countries across APJ - Experience managing complex, multi-stakeholder distributor relationships across sales, marketing, and executive functions.
• Strong command of channel mechanics: deal registration, margin stacking, MDF management, reseller tiering, and co-sell program execution. - Proficiency in Salesforce CRM for pipeline management, reporting, and partner attribution workflows.
• Excellent executive communication skills — written, verbal, and presentation — and equal comfort presenting to a CISO as to a room of reseller SEs. - Willingness and ability to travel onsite to distribution and reseller locations (estimated 20%–30%) for enablement events, QBRs, and partner marketing activities.

Bonus Points

• Direct experience with Elastic (ELK/ECE/ECK), Splunk, Datadog, CrowdStrike, or another enterprise observability or security analytics platform — including hands-on configuration or demonstration capability.
• Familiarity with partner program platforms (Impartner, Alliances, Salesforce PRM) and co-sell tools (Tackle/Clazar, WorkSpan). - Working knowledge of cloud marketplace procurement (AWS MP, Azure MP, GCP MP) as a transactional vector through distribution.
• Prior experience owning or supporting partner attribution framework rollouts or channel operations transformations.
• Background in working or partnering and contributing to designing formal sales or technical training content for partner ecosystem.