Business Development Manager - VC Ecosystem
Sales & Business Development
New York, NY, USA
About the job
About the Company
Nebex creates super powers for space founders. We are building market infrastructure for the global space economy, a platform where space companies can discover new revenue from sovereign contracts worldwide. Nebex transforms a fragmented, slow, complex industry into a coordinated market, enabling structured execution, visibility into capabilities, and efficient delivery across participants.
Role Overview
We are seeking a Space Startup Ecosystem Manager to focus on building the ecosystem for venture backed space startups.
Your primary responsibility will be to identify, engage, and build relationships with venture
capital firms directly, working on-site with them so that their portfolio companies sign up to and
onboard onto the platform. This is a portfolio-activation and referral channel, not a capital
deployment or investor relations function.
You will work directly with fund partners and principals to understand their portfolios, open the
door to the companies within them, and support those companies through onboarding onto the
platform alongside the wider supply-side team.
This role reports to the Chief Operating Officer and works closely with the Product, Go-to-Market, Customer Success, and Operations teams at Nebex.
Key Responsibilities
1. VC Relationship Management & Engagement
Identify, develop, and manage high-quality global relationships directly with venture capital firms across the space ecosystem: Early stage and growth stage venture capital funds, Corporate venture arms and strategic investors, Family offices and angel networks.
Engage partners, principals, and portfolio company founders directly.
2. Portfolio Company Sourcing & Onboarding
Work with VC partners to identify the space and space-adjacent companies within their portfolio
Guide portfolio companies through onboarding onto the platform
Ensure their offerings are clearly defined, structurally usable, and discoverable within the ecosystem
Drive active participation of portfolio companies in platform-driven opportunities
3. Capability Structuring & Resale Enablement
Work with portfolio companies to define how their components and services can be used within multi-party solutions
Collaborate with internal teams to ensure offerings can be integrated into larger system-level solutions
4. VC Network Development
Build depth of coverage across VC firms to support a steady pipeline of portfolio companies onto the platform
Identify and fill gaps in VC coverage across key ecosystem hubs
Ensure the platform can move beyond one-off introductions to a repeatable portfolio pipeline
5. Cross-Functional Collaboration
Work closely with the Platform Development team to structure onboarding tools and workflows for incoming portfolio companies
Work with the Supply-Side team to align incoming companies with real ecosystem needs
Provide continuous feedback to improve VC engagement, onboarding flow, and platform usability
6. Ecosystem Development & Representation
Represent Nebex directly with VC firms, spending time on-site with funds and their portfolios
Build relationships with fund principals, family offices, and strategic investors
Position the platform as the default onboarding route for portfolio companies in the space ecosystem
What Success Looks Like
Strong pipeline of VC relationships and onboarded portfolio companies
Broad coverage across VC firms and ecosystem hubs
Portfolio companies actively participating in platform-driven opportunities
Platform recognized as the default onboarding route for VC portfolio companies in the space economy
Qualifications
5-15 years in business development, partnerships, or ecosystem roles
Experience working directly with venture capital firms or their portfolio companies preferred
Strong ability to engage fund partners and translate portfolio relationships into onboarded companies
Comfortable operating in a fast-moving, early-stage environment, including on-site work with VC partners
Experience working across cross-functional teams
Space experience is a major plus
Startup experience is a major plus