The Inside Sales Representative (ISR) — Public Sector exists to accelerate net-new logo acquisition, run high-velocity transactional sales cycles, and secure land-and-expand revenue footprints within highly specialized government ecosystems.
This role serves as the premier entry point into a full quota-bearing Account Executive career path at Sonatype, specifically designed for high-performance Business Development Representatives (BDRs) ready to transition into full sales lifecycle ownership. This position demands an exceptionally high operational cadence, managing an expansive volume of high-velocity deals ranging typically from $5,000 to $25,000 ARR.
Depending on territory assignment, the ISR will specialize in one of two critical growth vectors:
Federal Track: Based in the Washington, DC Metro Area, focusing on civilian agencies, defense nodes, and federal systemic frameworks.
SLED Track: Based in the Central Territory, focusing on state and local agencies, municipalities, and higher education systems.
The role requires a relentless pipeline builder who thrives on high-activity volumes, proactively prospecting raw leads, responding rapidly to active inbound signals, navigating public procurement mechanisms (RFIs, RFPs, formal bid work), and collaborating deeply with channel distribution networks and fulfillment partners to close business smoothly.
Who you are:
Transition Ready Agility: Demonstrated success within a high-performing Business Development Representative (BDR) or Inside Sales role, showing a clear readiness to own a full quota and close business directly.
High-Velocity Stamina: Exceptional organizational skills and psychological resilience; comfortable managing 30+ active deal cycles concurrently without losing execution quality.
Public Sector Structural Aptitude: Foundational understanding of public procurement concepts (e.g., FAR, agency purchasing schedules, or state-specific contracting vehicles) or a rapid aptitude to learn them.
Value-Focused Communication: Ability to articulate complex Application Security Testing (AST) and SBOM compliance regulations in a clear, business-value manner to technical users and purchasing buyers.
Collaborative Execution Mindset: Highly skilled at working cross-functionally with pre-sales engineering, legal, channel partners, and regional field marketing teams.
Role Outcomes:
Success in this role looks like:
Pipeline Generation Self-Sufficiency: Rather than relying solely on inbound marketing or external generation, you proactively discover, cultivate, and advance your own outbound pipeline through continuous territory prospecting.
Velocity & Transactional Mastery: You maintain a balanced, high-volume deal portfolio, managing short sales cycles cleanly from initial engagement to close-won status while keeping your average transaction velocity high.
Procurement Execution Excellence: Public sector buying parameters—including RFIs, RFPs, and formal agency bid responses—are navigated accurately and delivered ahead of deadlines, maximizing our inclusion on critical contract vehicles.
Ecosystem Partner Harmonization: Channel partners, regional distributors (e.g., Carahsoft), and local fulfillment networks are activated seamlessly to accelerate transactions, clear procurement hurdles, and expand Sonatype's market footprint.
Your quarterly net-new logo and ARR quotas are met or exceeded with high predictability, avoiding end-of-quarter target clustering.
Sales tech stack data hygiene (Salesforce, Clari) is maintained flawlessly, reflecting accurate deal staging, realistic close dates, and clear buyer validation metrics.
Your prospecting activity metrics manifest as real, qualified pipeline velocity rather than unverified outward motions.
You will be successful when:
Role:
Full-Cycle Territory Ownership: Prospect, qualify, advance, and close high-velocity transaction flows within your assigned territory framework (Federal DC Metro or Central SLED).
High-Volume Cadence Management: Maintain a high daily volume of outbound touches (calls, emails, social outreach) to uncover latent application security needs inside target agencies.
Bid & Proposal Execution: Lead the internal orchestration and timely drafting of technical and commercial responses to public RFIs, RFPs, and agency solicitations.
Channel Alliance Alignment: Partner closely with regional channel accounts, systems integrators, and distribution partners to track registrations and secure transactional closure.
Value-Based Discovery Demonstrations: Conduct precise technical-commercial discoveries, positioning Sonatype’s automated software supply chain protection as a non-negotiable compliance standard.
Forecast Guardrail Maintenance: Protect territory forecasting hygiene through meticulous milestone updates inside our GTM execution platforms.
What we are proud of:
- Visionary in the 2025 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Application Security Testing
- 2025 DEVIES Award to our SBOM Manager new product for its innovation and impact in developer technology
- 2024 Industry Leader in Forrester-Wave for Software Composition Analysis (2024 Q4 report)
- 2023 Fast Company Best Places for Innovators
- 2023 Gartner's Magic Quadrant
- 2023 Software Report's Top 100 Software Companies
- 2023 BuiltIn Best Places to Work
- 2022 Frost & Sullivan Technology Innovation Leader Award
- 2022 PeerSpot Silver Peer Award in Software Composition Analysis
- 2022 Tech Ascension Best DevOps Security Solution Award
- 2022 NVCT Cyber Company of the Year
- Company Wellness Week - We shut down company operations for a week to enable all employees to pursue personal growth and enjoy a much-needed and deserved rest.
- Paid Volunteer Time Off (VTO)
Skills Required
- Proven success in a high-performing BDR or Inside Sales role and readiness to own full sales lifecycle
- Ability to manage 30+ active high-velocity deal cycles concurrently
- Foundational understanding of public procurement (FAR, agency schedules) or rapid aptitude to learn them
- Ability to articulate Application Security Testing (AST) and SBOM compliance to technical and purchasing stakeholders
- Experience prospecting outbound, generating pipeline, and executing territory-based prospecting
- Experience drafting and managing responses to RFIs, RFPs, and agency solicitations
- Strong cross-functional collaboration with pre-sales, legal, channel partners, and field marketing
- Maintain sales tech stack data hygiene (Salesforce, Clari) with accurate deal staging and forecasting
- Based in assigned territory (Washington DC Metro for Federal track or Central Territory for SLED track)
- Experience working with channel distributors or government-focused partners (e.g., Carahsoft)
What We Do
The Sonatype journey started almost 15 years ago, just as the concept of “open source” software development was gaining steam. From our humble beginning as core contributors to Apache Maven, to supporting the world’s largest repository of open source components (Central), to distributing the world's most popular repository manager (Nexus), we’ve played a meaningful role in helping the world embrace the power of open innovation. We empower developers and security professionals with intelligent tools to innovate more securely at scale. Our platform addresses every element of an organization’s entire software development life cycle, including third-party open source code, first-party source code, and containerized code. Sonatype identifies critical security vulnerabilities and code quality issues and reports results directly to developers when they can most effectively fix them. This helps organizations develop consistently high-quality, secure software which fully meets their business needs and those of their end-customers and partners. More than 2,000 organizations, including 70% of the Fortune 100, and 15 million software developers rely on our tools and guidance to help them deliver and maintain exceptional and secure software.
Why Work With Us
We're on a mission to change how the world innovates by making software development easier. Already used by 15 million developers, we have lofty goals for our technology to be in the hands of every engineering team. And, we need you to do that. Join us!
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