Senior Manager, Channel Partnerships

About the Role:
The Senior Manager, Channel Partnerships, UAE owns the commercial execution and performance of an assigned UAE partner portfolio, from identifying and negotiating new opportunities to coordinating launches, enabling partner teams, and growing active merchants and transaction volume.
This role translates market opportunities into practical partner plans and delivers measurable outcomes across merchant acquisition, activation, GMV, and MDR while working within the company's broader channel strategy and UAE commercial priorities. The position melds hands-on business development, senior partner relationship management, commercial analysis, and cross-functional delivery.

Your Responsibilities:

UAE Partner Strategy and Pipeline Development

• Translate UAE commercial priorities and the wider channel strategy into a focused partner acquisition and growth plan.
• Map and prioritize payment service providers, acquirers, POS networks, e-commerce platforms, software providers, aggregators, referral partners, and relevant vertical ecosystems.
• Assess opportunities against addressable merchant base, category and segment fit, distribution reach, technical readiness, activation potential, risk profile, and expected economics.
• Build and manage a qualified pipeline, with clear next steps, accountable owners, and realistic contract, launch, and revenue timelines.
• Identify opportunities to extend partner distribution across online and in-store merchant journeys.

Partner Acquisition and Commercial Negotiation

• Originate and develop new channel relationships and build trusted connections with commercial and technical decision-makers.
• Prepare business cases covering merchant potential, expected conversion, GMV, revenue, revenue share, integration requirements, costs, and time to value.
• Recommend the appropriate approved partnership model, including integrated referral, non-integrated referral, or reseller arrangements.
• Lead negotiations within delegated authority on commercial terms, incentives, partner commitments, service levels, and joint go-to-market activity.
• Coordinate contracting with Legal and obtain required pricing, risk, compliance, and commercial approvals; escalate exceptions rather than committing outside approved authority.

Partner Enablement and Merchant Activation

• Build joint business plans with priority partners, including target merchant segments, acquisition motions, activation milestones, and commercial commitments.
• Equip partner sales and support teams with training, product knowledge, sales playbooks, collateral, and clear escalation routes.
• Coordinate co-marketing, campaigns, referrals, and merchant outreach with Marketing and UAE Sales teams.
• Establish clear rules for lead registration, attribution, routing, ownership, and handoffs to avoid channel conflict and duplication.
• Improve conversion from partner-sourced lead to onboarded merchant, first transaction, and sustained activity.
• Identify expansion opportunities within partner portfolios, including additional merchant categories, online and in-store adoption, and eligible product propositions.

Portfolio Growth and Partner Relationship Management

• Own the performance and health of the assigned UAE partner portfolio against agreed acquisition, activation, GMV, revenue, and quality goals.
• Run regular performance reviews and quarterly business reviews with priority partners, supported by clear scorecards and action plans.
• Develop senior relationships, manage commercial escalations, and coordinate timely resolution of partner issues.
• Diagnose underperformance across the funnel and implement recovery plans with partner and internal owners.
• Track and analyze key partner performance metrics—including lead-to-conversion rates, GMV velocity, cohort retention, and yield—using data-driven insights to evaluate channel ROI, detect underperformance early, and optimize strategic focus.

Your Expertise:

• Significant experience in channel partnerships, strategic partnerships, business development, platform partnerships, payments, acquiring, fintech, e-commerce, SaaS, or another ecosystem-led distribution business.
• Demonstrated success building and scaling partner channels that delivered measurable merchant or customer acquisition, activation, revenue, and GMV.
• Strong understanding of referral, reseller, aggregator, marketplace, payment-provider, acquirer, and POS partnership models.
• Proven ability to negotiate complex commercial agreements, revenue shares, pricing structures, incentives, and multi-year commitments.
• Experience managing technical integrations and cross-functional launch programs with Product, Engineering, Operations, Legal, Risk, Compliance, and Finance.
• Strong commercial and analytical capability across pipeline, conversion, unit economics, partner profitability, cohort quality, and forecasting.
• Experience designing partner tiering, enablement, scorecards, QBRs, rules of engagement, and incentive models.
• Ability to balance ambitious growth with regulatory, credit, fraud, settlement, and operational considerations.
• Strong senior stakeholder management and executive communication skills, internally and with partners.
• Experience leading multi-market or geographically distributed partnership teams.
• Familiarity with GCC commerce platforms, PSPs, acquirers, POS providers, and merchant ecosystems is strongly preferred.
• Arabic capability is advantageous; excellent English communication is required.