Mode Labs
Head of Business Development / Commercial Lead
Get notified of more jobs like this · No spam, ever
How your CV stacks up
Upload your CV to see how well it fits this job role
?%
Build the commercial engine behind the next generation of autonomous chemical sensing.
Mode Labs is developing an autonomous opto-chemical sensing platform for remote environmental monitoring. We are looking for a commercially astute, technically credible relationship-builder to lead our transition from field trials and early customer interest to repeatable commercial adoption.
THE ROLE
You will own commercial strategy and business development as Mode Labs moves from product development into paid beta trials and first sales. Initially, you will work hands-on across customer development, propositions, pricing, marketing, CRM, and forecasting, while building a disciplined route from technical trial to commercial purchase.
Reporting to the CEO and working as part of the senior leadership team, you will work closely with the CTO and product-development team to ensure that customer requirements shape our product roadmap and commercial priorities. The role begins as a senior individual-contributor and functional-lead position. As sales scale, you will build and lead the wider commercial team.
What You'll Do
Commercial Strategy, Sales and Revenue
- Own the commercial strategy for the initial UK water and environmental-monitoring market, defining priority customers, propositions, routes to market, and milestones
- Build and convert the pipeline from early engagement through paid beta trials to commercial purchase
- Lead customer discovery, proposals, pricing, and negotiations, defining clear trial objectives and purchase criteria
- Refine the business and revenue model, including pricing, recurring revenues, margins, and customer lifetime value, and own pipeline and revenue forecasting
Customer Requirements, Product And Market Development
- Establish a structured customer-requirements process, capturing use cases, performance needs, deployment constraints, and procurement requirements
- Work with the CTO and development team to translate customer and market evidence into a prioritized product roadmap, including analytes, product improvements, and adjacent applications
- Balance individual customer requests against wider market demand, technical effort, and commercial potential
- Track customers, competitors, regulation, and market developments to identify new sectors, geographies, and routes to market
- Develop the longer-term commercial roadmap beyond the initial UK water market, identifying attractive adjacent sectors, geographies, and partnership routes
Marketing, Evidence and Partnerships
- Develop the marketing strategy and core sales collateral, turning beta trials into credible evidence, case studies, and customer-facing content
- Build trusted relationships across the water sector and relevant technical communities, representing Mode Labs with customers, partners, and industry stakeholders
- Identify and develop commercially valuable partnerships, pilots, and grant-funded opportunities, working with the CEO and CTO where appropriate
Commercial Operations, Customer Success and Scale-up
- Establish and own the CRM, sales process, qualification criteria, commercial metrics, and reporting
- Define and manage the customer journey from initial engagement through trial, purchase, deployment, and repeat business
- Work across engineering, manufacturing, and quality to establish a scalable customer-support and service model covering commissioning, servicing, calibration, and technical support
- Define the structure, incentives, and recruitment plan for the wider sales team as demand grows
WHAT SUCCESS LOOKS LIKE
Within your first 100 days, you will have:
- Built a strong understanding of our technology, target markets, customers, and commercial pipeline.
- Reviewed and prioritized the existing pipeline, with clear qualification criteria and CRM stages.
- Secured, or materially advanced toward contract, at least one paid beta trial with a priority customer.
- Defined the customer journey from initial engagement through beta trial to commercial purchase, including clear trial success criteria.
- Reviewed pricing and revenue models and developed a credible commercial forecast.
- Agreed a focused commercial and marketing plan covering priority accounts, collateral, evidence generation, and partnerships.
Reasons to use Rodeo
Start with a chat, not a search bar
Grad scheme, placement, apprenticeship? Not sure what you want yet — that's fine. Your agent talks it through with you and turns "I have no idea" into a shortlist.
It searches the market for you
Every day your agent scans the market matching roles against what actually matters to you, not just keywords on a CV.
Only hits
No noise. No "maybe this fits." Just roles with a clear explanation of why they're right — and where to focus when applying.
By the end of your first year, you will have:
- Secured paid customer engagements and demonstrated a credible route from beta trials to repeatable commercial sales.
- Built a qualified pipeline and revenue forecast with clear priorities, ownership, and next steps.
- Established a practical CRM and repeatable sales process.
- Embedded customer requirements into product and analyte roadmap decisions.
- Built commercial evidence through customer data, case studies, publications, or presentations.
- Defined a scalable customer-success, support, and service model that supports recurring revenue.
- Identified and developed the most valuable commercial partnerships and collaborative funding opportunities.
- Begun building the wider sales team, with a clear plan for future recruitment and incentives.
Requirements
ABOUT YOU
You are a commercially minded relationship-builder with enough technical credibility to understand a customer's problem, ask the right questions, and work constructively with engineers, scientists, and operators. You build trust through curiosity, competence, and follow-through rather than over-selling.
You are comfortable bringing structure to an early market, where the sales process, customer proposition, and product requirements are still being refined. You understand that trials and partnerships are only valuable when they move the business towards adoption and revenue.
You have substantial industry experience and may have a degree, HND, or apprenticeship in a relevant engineering, scientific, or commercial discipline.
Essential Experience
- Significant experience in business development, commercial, or technical sales roles for complex B2B products, services, or technology
- A track record of launching or commercializing at least one new technical product or service, ideally moving from pilot, early adopter, or demonstration activity into repeatable revenue
- Experience of consultative selling to technical, operational, scientific, engineering, procurement, or senior decision-making stakeholders
- Strong relationship-building skills and the judgement to develop credibility across long, multi-stakeholder sales cycles
- Experience defining customer needs and translating market evidence into product requirements, propositions, or roadmap decisions
- Practical experience of CRM, pipeline management, opportunity qualification, revenue forecasting, and commercial metrics
- Strong commercial and financial acumen, including pricing, business cases, proposals, contracts, negotiation, and forecast development
- Experience supporting or leading customer trials, demonstrations, or pilots with clear success criteria and conversion objectives
- Ability to work effectively with technical teams, communicate customer priorities clearly, and make sound decisions with incomplete information
- Willingness to remain hands-on with customer meetings, proposals, account plans, sales materials, and commercial problem-solving
Desirable Experience
- UK water, wastewater, environmental monitoring, catchment management, or related utility markets
- Environmental or engineering consultancy, industrial process technology, scientific instrumentation, analytical equipment, or sensor businesses
- Selling hardware with recurring consumables, service, calibration, software, or support revenues
- Selling to regulated utilities, public-sector organizations, engineering contractors, or framework-based procurement environments
- Developing customer-success, technical-support, or service models for deployed instrumentation
- Collaborative R&D, grant-funded projects, or other non-dilutive funding mechanisms involving customers and commercial partners
- Building commercial evidence through case studies, conferences, publications, reference customers, or industry partnerships
- Recruiting, coaching, or developing sales and business-development teams
- International market development or distributor and channel partnerships
Get help with your application
Your very own career expert that helps elevate your application to the next level.
Eligibility
The successful candidate must be able to demonstrate the right to work in the UK. The role requires regular travel to customers, partners, trials, and industry events across the UK, with occasional overseas travel.
BENEFITS
WHAT WE OFFER
- Salary: £75,000 - £85,000 p.a. depending on skills and experience, plus an annual performance bonus linked to agreed commercial objectives.
- Benefits:
- Employee share-option scheme
- 25 days paid leave plus bank holidays
- Company pension contributions matched up to 5%.
- Group life & legacy cover
- Annual discretionary training allowance
- One paid charity volunteering day per year
- Travel-to-work loan and cycle-to-work salary sacrifice schemes
- Flexible working arrangements where practical
This role is advertised as full-time, although 0.8 FTE will be considered. Flexible or hybrid arrangements may be possible. However, we expect the successful candidate to spend the majority of their working time in Oxfordshire during their first 3-6 months to build relationships with the team and develop a detailed understanding of the product and market. Thereafter, greater flexibility may be possible, recognizing that the role will involve significant UK and occasional international travel.
How To Apply
Please apply via the application link, submitting your CV and a short statement explaining why you would be a strong fit for the role.
Closing date: Open until filled. Applications will be reviewed as received.
Preferred start: By January 2027.
Interview Process: Shortlisted candidates will complete an initial telephone or video call followed by an in-person interview. The interview may include a short technical exercise or presentation based on relevant previous experience; details will be provided in advance.
Disclaimer: Whilst we will aim to get back to everyone who applies, we are a small company and may not be able to provide feedback to all applicants. We apologize for this inconvenience.
EQUAL OPPORTUNITIES
We are an equal opportunities employer and commit to encouraging equality, diversity, and inclusion in the workplace whilst creating an environment which promotes dignity and respect for all. We post our job descriptions across a wide range of recruitment platforms to enable us to attract the most diverse range of candidates we possibly can.
ADJUSTMENTS AND PROVISIONS
We want our recruitment process to be accessible. If you need a reasonable adjustment at any stage, please contact us and tell us what would help. You do not need to disclose a diagnosis to request an adjustment.
About Mode Labs
Mode Labs is a customer-driven technology company developing the next generation of autonomous chemical sensing systems for environmental monitoring. Based in Oxford, UK, the company was founded in 2024 as a spin
“It took my CV and asked me questions relevant to understanding what kind of jobs to suggest for me. Suggestions were almost perfect. Jobs were exactly what I’ve been looking for.”
Jessica, London
Location