Summary
This role will focus on managing and accelerating the performance of sales territories through coordinated efforts between sales channel business partners (distributors and dealers) and the ONT Sales team in Japan. This position will be supported broadly by the ONT Commercial division, including Business Operations, Customer and Technical Support and MarComms teams; and the Senior Director Sales APAC .
Key Responsibilities:
- Contributing to the development of a long-term Strategic plan for Japan including identification of high growth potential segments and geographies
- Strategic planning of the commercial and sales performance of Oxford Nanopore in Japan, together with the Regional Leader and local sales staff
- Reporting of key activities, forecasting and business performance metrics to Oxford Nanopore group leadership
- Gathering potential key account information and identifying and closing new opportunities
- Contributing to planning to disrupt the existing NGS market
- Understanding of funding cycles and the decision-making process in designated key accounts
- Delivering to the agreed commercial targets for MinION, GridION and PromethION systems
- Contributing to the development of the Japan channel partner strategy, including the identification of appropriate dealers for ONT to partner with to drive sustainable growth.
- Working in close collaboration with Channel Partners and Distributors Dealers to complete a comprehensive territory sales growth plan
- Adhering to standard methodologies for tracking, recording and detailing relevant commercial intelligence from all customer interactions
- Handling weekly sales prospective information and reporting and updating the regional team
Managing the performance of the extended sales team in Japan.
Duties
Duties include, but are not limited to:
• Maintain and optimize distribution/dealer networks capable of meeting defined commercial targets in agreed regions
• Monitor each dealers’ performance and plan necessary actions to ensure performance expectations are met
• Maintain coordinated relationships between dealers and Regional ONT Sales staff to enhance business objectives in each defined territory
• Ensure that dealers are regularly provided with well-informed product and technical updates, working together with the Technical Support and Sales Specialist teams
• Ensure that dealers adhere to best practices as set out together with the Senior Director Sales APAC
• Manage weekly sales prospective information from each dealer base and report/update to the Senior Director Sales APAC
• Work with Customer Support team to prioritise and manage concerns reported by dealers and sales staff in a timely manner
• Understanding of funding cycles and decision-making process in Japan
• Adhere to best practices for tracking, recording and documenting relevant commercial intelligence from all dealer interactions and customer interactions
• Set commercial success goals and ensure local commercial team is performing to expectation
• Any other duties as might be required within the remit and responsibilities of the post.
Qualifications/Experience:
BSc degree (preferably in the Lifesciences)
- Proven track record as a commercial leader managing sales channels in Japan
- Experience of working under pressure with minimum supervision in a highly matrixed sales and service environment
- Experience working with CRM to track sales activity
- Knowledge of the Life Sciences
- Local knowledge of Japanese best business practices
- Strong communication skills, Japanese and English, written and verbal
- Good business sense and the ability to work to budgets
- Good organisational and time management skills
- Confidence, tact
- Positive, can-do attitude
- Team-oriented approach to learning
Please note that no terminology in this advert is intended to discriminate on the grounds of a person's gender, marital status, race, religion, colour, age, disability or sexual orientation. Every candidate will be assessed only in accordance with their merits, qualifications and abilities to perform the duties of the job.
Oxford Nanopore Technologies: Our goal is to bring the widest benefits to society through enabling the analysis of anything, by anyone, anywhere. The company has developed a new generation of nanopore-based sensing technology for faster, information rich, accessible and affordable molecular analysis. The first application is DNA/RNA sequencing, and the technology is in development for the analysis of other types of molecules including proteins. The technology is used to understand and characterise the biology of humans and diseases such as cancer, plants, animals, bacteria, viruses, and whole environments. With a thriving culture of ambition and strong innovation goals, Oxford Nanopore is a UK headquartered company with global operations and customers in more than 125 countries.
Skills Required
- BSc degree, preferably in the life sciences
- Proven track record as a commercial leader managing sales channels in Japan
- Experience working under pressure with minimal supervision in a highly matrixed sales and service environment
- Experience using CRM systems to track sales activity
- Knowledge of the life sciences
- Knowledge of Japanese business practices
- Strong written and verbal communication skills in Japanese and English
- Business judgment and ability to work within budgets
- Good organizational and time-management skills
- Confidence and tact
- Positive, proactive attitude and team-oriented approach
Oxford Nanopore Technologies Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Oxford Nanopore Technologies and has not been reviewed or approved by Oxford Nanopore Technologies.
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Fair & Transparent Compensation — Pay is considered good to above average across many roles, with employer-provided ranges visible for several U.S. commercial and applications positions and company materials emphasizing market‑competitive base pay. Commercial and some senior technical posts, particularly in the U.S., are positioned as competitive and often paired with strong variable components.
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Equity Value & Accessibility — All‑employee share plans in the UK and a U.S. employee stock purchase plan indicate broad access to equity as part of total reward. Company communications highlight attractive bonus and share plans that add meaningful upside beyond base pay.
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Healthcare Strength — U.S. roles indicate strong health insurance and core protections, while official materials and country overviews reference private medical coverage and wellbeing support. These elements position the health package as a notable strength alongside cash compensation.
Oxford Nanopore Technologies Insights
What We Do
Our goal is to enable the analysis of anything, anywhere, by anyone. We have developed the world’s first and only nanopore DNA and RNA sequencing platform. It’s a new generation of sequencing technology — the only one to offer: scalability to portable or ultra-high throughput formats, real-time data delivery, and the ability to elucidate rich biological data. We are aiming to disrupt the way that biological analyses are currently performed, and open up new applications that have a profound, positive impact on society. Our devices offer real-time analysis, for rapid insights, in fully scalable formats — from pocket to population scale — and the technology is being used in more than 100 countries worldwide. Founded in 2005 as a spin-out from the University of Oxford, the company now employs more than 600 people from multiple disciplines including nanopore science, molecular biology and applications, informatics, engineering, electronics, manufacturing and commercialisation. The management team, led by CEO Dr Gordon Sanghera, has a track record of delivering disruptive technologies to the market.
