Head of Business Development, North America

About the role

As our first business leader on the ground in the US, you will own the full picture of our North America expansion — from go-to-market strategy and city rollout to channel build-out and customer conversion. This is a hands-on builder role, not a strategy-only role.

You will be the bridge between the US market and our China HQ, and the person who decides how far this market goes for SenseMART, a Chinese brand focused on AI-powered vending machine.

Responsibilities

• Own the US business end-to-end: market entry, sales targets, priority-city expansion, channel layout, and conversion from pilot units to volume orders.
• Build and lead the local team: full-time reps, city-based sellers, channel and partner managers. Set up the sales process, CRM, weekly reviews, and KPIs.
• Develop the partner ecosystem: distributors, operators, brands, system integrators, venue owners, and industry players — moving them from demo → test units → volume purchase or distribution.
• Run on-the-ground expansion: deploy pilot units, manage trial operations, host customer visits, and turn test units into batch orders.
• Be the bridge to HQ: feed customer needs, competitor moves, product/price feedback, and after-sales issues back to our China team — and drive alignment.
• Track the market: turn competitor intel in the US into strategy the company can act on.

Qualifications

• 5+ years in B2B sales, channel, or business leadership for hardware, IoT, smart vending, retail tech, F&B equipment, or payment terminals. US 0-to-1 experience is a strong plus. Former founders/leads of China-US cross-border hardware companies or overseas subsidiaries preferred.
• End-to-end hardware fluency: sales, delivery, installation, after-sales, iteration — comfortable with inventory, logistics, on-site deployment, and customer training.
• Knows the US B2B playbook: can independently run customer visits, sign up distributors, and close deals with operators, dealers, venues, and service providers.
• A team builder: sets targets, manages pipeline, coaches reps, runs deal reviews, and drives sales through CRM and data.
• A doer, not a deck-maker: ships in ambiguity — runs customers, builds teams, sets up processes, and wins orders. Communicates effectively with a China HQ and translates US customer reality back home.