Venture Partnerships Manager

About Airwallex
Airwallex is the only unified payments and financial platform for global businesses. Powered by our unique combination of proprietary infrastructure and software, we empower over 200,000 businesses worldwide - including Brex, Rippling, Navan, Qantas, SHEIN and many more - with fully integrated solutions to manage everything from business accounts, payments, spend management and treasury, to embedded finance at a global scale.
Proudly founded in Melbourne, we have a team of over 2,000 of the brightest and most innovative people in tech across 26 offices around the globe. Valued at US$8 billion and backed by world-leading investors including T. Rowe Price, Visa, Mastercard, Robinhood Ventures, Sequoia, Salesforce Ventures, DST Global, and Lone Pine Capital, Airwallex is leading the charge in building the global payments and financial platform of the future. If you're ready to do the most ambitious work of your career, join us.
Attributes We Value
We hire successful builders with founder-like energy who want real impact, accelerated learning, and true ownership. You bring strong role-related expertise and sharp thinking, and you're motivated by our mission and operating principles. You move fast with good judgment, dig deep with curiosity, and make decisions from first principles, balancing speed and rigor.
You're humble and collaborative; turn zero-to-one ideas into real products, and you "get stuff done" end-to-end. You use AI to work smarter and solve problems faster. Here, you'll tackle complex, high-visibility problems with exceptional teammates and grow your career as we build the future of global banking. If that sounds like you, let's build what's next.
Airwallex is building a dedicated Startups organisation to make Airwallex the default financial infrastructure for high-growth, venture-backed companies across Asia. The Venture Partnerships Manager is a foundational hire for our expansion into East Asia - responsible for building and deepening relationships with VCs, accelerators, and ecosystem players to drive awareness, referrals, and brand authority for Airwallex within the startup community.
This is not a traditional channel partnerships role. You'll be the face of Airwallex in the local venture ecosystem - attending and co-hosting events, earning trust with investors and founders, and creating the warm introduction pipeline that feeds our startup sales motion. You'll work shoulder-to-shoulder with a small, high-intensity team that operates more like a startup within a scale-up.
What You'll Do

• Build and own VC relationships across your home market (Korea or Japan) and beyond, including both of those markets as well as Hong Kong and Taiwan. Engage with partners from working-level associates to GP/Partner level - with the goal of becoming a trusted, go-to contact for portfolio company introductions.
• Drive referral pipeline by mapping priority VC portfolios, identifying high-fit portcos, and generating qualified warm introductions for our team to work with.
• Plan and execute ecosystem events - from low-touch sponsorships and founder dinners to co-hosted sessions with tier-one VC partners. Target: ~4 qualified events per quarter involving priority VCs, with 30+ attendees and meaningful founder engagement.
• Represent Airwallex at venture, startup, and ecosystem events - articulating our value proposition credibly to founders, operators, and investors.
• Develop and maintain active partnerships with accelerators, incubators, government innovation programs, and other ecosystem players relevant to the local market.
• Collaborate closely with the Singapore-based team as well as in-market commercial teams to ensure cross-market coordination on partner engagement, event strategy, and targeted sales.
• Track and report on partnership health, partner portfolio coverage, referral volume, and event outcomes against defined quarterly KPIs.

Who You Are
Minimum Qualifications:

• 3-5+ years in venture partnerships, VC ecosystem development, startup community building, or a related role within fintech, SaaS, or high-growth tech.
• Demonstrated experience working with or alongside venture capital firms, startup founders, or accelerator programs - with a genuine understanding of how VC ecosystems operate.
• Strong relationship-building instincts - comfortable engaging credibly with investors, founders, and senior operators across company stages.
• Excellent external communication skills - able to clearly articulate a platform value proposition in both 1:1 and group settings.
• Highly organised and execution-oriented - able to manage multiple relationships, events, and initiatives in parallel.
• Native Korean or Japanese (depending on market), plus fluent English.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Existing network within the Korea or Japan VC/startup ecosystem.
• Experience supporting or executing events: founder dinners, panels, demo days, or co-hosted partner activations.
• Familiarity with cross-border financial operations, payments, or fintech products.
• Comfort operating in ambiguous, fast-moving environments with limited oversight.
• A second Asian language (Mandarin, Cantonese, Bahasa, Thai, Vietnamese) is a plus.

Why This Role

• You'll be planting the flag for Airwallex's startup motion in a major East Asian market - a genuinely zero-to-one opportunity.
• You'll have the backing of a US$8B global platform with 80+ licenses, but operate with the speed and autonomy of an early-stage team.
• You'll work directly with senior leadership and shape the strategy, not just execute it.
• Korea and Japan are massive, under-penetrated startup ecosystems for Airwallex - the upside is enormous.

Applicant Safety Policy: Fraud and Third-Party Recruiters
To protect you from recruitment scams, please be aware that Airwallex will not ask for bank details, sensitive ID numbers (i.e. passport), or any form of payment during the application or interview process. All official communication will come from an @airwallex.com email address. Please apply only through careers.airwallex.com or our official LinkedIn page.
Airwallex does not accept unsolicited resumes from search firms/recruiters. Airwallex will not pay any fees to search firms/recruiters if a candidate is submitted by a search firm/recruiter unless an agreement has been entered into with respect to specific open position(s). Search firms/recruiters submitting resumes to Airwallex on an unsolicited basis shall be deemed to accept this condition, regardless of any other provision to the contrary.
Equal opportunity
Airwallex is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We value diversity and anyone seeking employment at Airwallex is considered based on merit, qualifications, competence and talent. We don't regard color, religion, race, national origin, sexual orientation, ancestry, citizenship, sex, marital or family status, disability, gender, or any other legally protected status when making our hiring decisions. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation, please let us know.