The Role
Lead technology-focused business development across AI, data systems, digital public infrastructure, GovTech, and digital transformation opportunities. Manage pipeline qualification, market intelligence, client and partner relationships, capture planning, proposal development, submissions, and BD analytics. Coordinate cross-functional teams, maintain CRM and knowledge systems, use generative AI in workflows, and support growth across Athena Infonomics, TolaData, and APLYD.
Summary Generated by Built In
Position: Growth Manager / Assistant Manager – Technology & Group Ventures
Function: Central Business Development (CBD), Athena Infonomics Group
Location: India / Remote
Position Type: Full Time
Start Date: Immediate; applications reviewed on a rolling basis
About the Athena Group
The Athena Group works at the intersection of evidence, technology, and impact. Athena Infonomics is a global research and advisory firm that helps governments, multilaterals, foundations, and impact investors make better decisions across public health, education, WASH, climate, economic development, and digital public infrastructure. TolaData, our Berlin-based software company, gives impact organisations a platform to plan, monitor, and report on their programmes in real time. APLYD, our newest venture, designs and builds AI and digital public infrastructure solutions that governments and funders use to scale their missions.
Three businesses, one flywheel: the advisory work surfaces problems worth solving, the technology businesses build the solutions, and every client relationship strengthens all three. This role sits at the centre of that flywheel.
Why This Role
This is not a proposal-coordination job. We are looking for someone who wants to help build the growth engine of a group that is scaling fast across services, SaaS, and AI. Your primary focus will be technology-led opportunities, spanning AI, data systems, digital public infrastructure, GovTech, and digital transformation, where the group is investing most heavily. But you will have the room, and the expectation, to work across all three businesses as opportunities demand: an Athena evaluation bid one week, a TolaData platform pursuit the next, an APLYD AI engagement after that.
You will work directly with group leadership and practice heads, sit close to real client conversations, and see how deals are found, shaped, won, and grown. For someone with ambition, this is one of the fastest ways to learn how a multi-entity impact business actually grows.
What You Will Do
Group growth and opportunity development (primary focus: technology)
- Lead business development support for technology-led opportunities across the group: AI, data systems, digital public infrastructure, API ecosystems, GovTech, data governance, and digital transformation.
- Track, qualify, and prioritise opportunities from multilaterals, bilaterals, foundations, governments, DFIs, corporates, and impact-focused private organisations, and flex across Athena, TolaData, and APLYD pipelines as group priorities require.
- Run early-stage opportunity assessment: client fit, technical alignment, eligibility, competitive landscape, partner options, and bid/no-bid recommendations that leadership can act on.
- Build and maintain a focused pipeline for the group's technology and AI growth agenda, and help route opportunities to the right entity.
- Translate the group's technical capabilities into sharp positioning: capability statements, concept notes, opportunity briefs, and win themes.
Client engagement and relationship management
- Support senior leadership in managing high-value client and partner relationships: preparing for meetings, capturing intelligence, following through on commitments, and keeping momentum between conversations.
- Join client conversations, demos, and partner discussions where appropriate, and progressively take ownership of relationships within your remit.
- Maintain a clear picture of who matters to the group's growth (clients, funders, primes, technology partners) and ensure relationships are cultivated deliberately rather than episodically.
- Coordinate account-level intelligence across the three businesses so the group shows up to every client as one team.
Pursuit and proposal leadership
- Drive the end-to-end pursuit lifecycle for assigned opportunities: capture planning, partner assembly, proposal development, compliance, and submission.
- Coordinate inputs across technical practices, finance, HR, operations, and external partners, and hold the timeline.
- Prepare expressions of interest, concept notes, technical proposals, CV matrices, past performance references, and submission annexures to a standard that wins.
- Capture what each pursuit teaches us: win-loss learning, reusable content, and sharper positioning for the next bid.
Market, client, and competitor intelligence
- Produce market intelligence the group actually uses: funding trends in AI for development, DPI, GovTech, and responsible AI; donor and client priorities; competitor moves and awarded contracts.
- Map partners for specific bids and for longer-term positioning, including primes, subs, technology partners, and research institutions.
- Feed intelligence into bid/no-bid decisions, capture plans, and leadership strategy conversations.
BD analytics and AI-enabled ways of working
- Own the accuracy and usefulness of BD dashboards, pipeline data, CRM entries, and leadership reporting; surface insights on conversion, trends, and where to focus.
- Use GenAI tools ambitiously and responsibly across research, drafting, compliance review, and knowledge management, and help the wider BD team raise its game with reusable prompts, templates, and workflows.
- Keep the group's BD knowledge base (credentials, references, CVs, case studies, reusable content) organised and battle-ready.
Qualifications & Experience
Required
- Master's degree in business, economics, public policy, development studies, management, social sciences, data analytics, technology policy, information systems, or a related field.
- Assistant Manager level: 3–6 years of relevant experience, including proposal development, opportunity tracking, market research, and cross-team coordination.
- Manager level: 6–8 years of relevant experience, with demonstrated ability to independently run BD workstreams, engage senior stakeholders, and lead structured market and opportunity research.
Preferred
- Experience in consulting, international development, technology consulting, SaaS, research advisory, or digital transformation organisations.
- Familiarity with proposal and procurement processes of multilaterals, bilaterals, foundations, governments, and DFIs.
- Prior BD or pursuit experience in AI, data governance, ICT, DPI, API platforms, GovTech, or related technology-enabled development domains.
- Experience with client-facing work: account support, relationship management, partnership development, or key account coordination.
- Working comfort with CRM systems, dashboards, and BD analytics tools (Salesforce, Power BI, Tableau, or similar).
- Hands-on use of GenAI tools (Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, or similar) in real workflows.
Skills That Matter Here
- Sharp written and verbal communication; you can turn technical depth into language a client acts on.
- Strong stakeholder instincts: you read the room, manage upward well, and earn the trust of senior people quickly.
- Attention to detail where it counts: compliance, documentation, and submission readiness.
- Comfort running multiple workstreams at pace without dropping quality.
- An analytical mindset: at ease with pipelines, structured data, and BD performance metrics.
- Genuine curiosity about AI, DPI, and technology-enabled development, and the judgment to handle confidential strategy and client information.
What Success Looks Like
- The group's technology and AI pipeline is systematically tracked, well qualified, and visibly converting.
- Pursuits you run are coordinated, compliant, on time, and positioned to win.
- Leadership trusts you with high-value client relationships, and clients experience the group as one coherent team.
- BD data and intelligence sharpen real decisions about where the group plays and how it wins.
- Within a year, you are a recognised driver of the group's growth agenda, not a back-office resource.
Who Thrives in This Role
Someone entrepreneurial who wants a front-row seat to how an impact business scales across services, software, and AI. You enjoy moving between the detail of a compliant submission and the bigger question of where the next ten deals come from. You are energised by client conversations, quick to build credibility with technical experts, and ambitious about what AI-enabled ways of working can do for a growth team. If you want a role where the scope expands as fast as you can grow into it, this is it.
To apply, please upload your CV along with a short note outlining a pursuit, partnership, or client relationship you helped win or grow. Please include the note in the same document as your CV.
Additional Requirements
- This position requires successful completion of a reference check and employment verification.
- The successful candidate must not be subject to employment restrictions from a former employer (such as a non-compete) that would prevent the candidate from performing the job responsibilities as described.
- Only candidates who have India work authorization will be considered.
Athena’s Work Culture
At Athena, we function in an outcomes-based work environment with flexible hours and a high level of autonomy. Professional development and thought leadership are key elements of our business model: we support our team members' professional growth through on-the-job training, and we encourage the cultivation of our colleagues’ personal brands through participation in panels, events, publications, and other thought-leadership opportunities. We embrace a transparent, open work environment with meaningful leadership pathways for those with inventive ideas and initiatives
Athena Infonomics is an Equal Opportunities Employer
Athena Infonomics is an equal opportunity employer with a commitment to diversity. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, protected veteran status, or disability status.
AI Proficiency and Responsible Use
Proficiency in the responsible and sophisticated use of AI is a mandatory requirement for all roles, across all levels and functions at Athena Infonomics
Skills Required
- Master's degree in business, economics, public policy, development studies, management, social sciences, data analytics, technology policy, information systems, or a related field
- Assistant Manager candidates: 3–6 years of relevant experience, including proposal development, opportunity tracking, market research, and cross-team coordination
- Manager candidates: 6–8 years of relevant experience, with demonstrated ability to independently run business development workstreams, engage senior stakeholders, and lead structured market and opportunity research
- Experience in consulting, international development, technology consulting, SaaS, research advisory, or digital transformation organizations
- Familiarity with proposal and procurement processes for multilaterals, bilaterals, foundations, governments, and DFIs
- Business development or pursuit experience in AI, data governance, ICT, DPI, API platforms, GovTech, or related technology-enabled development domains
- Client-facing experience in account support, relationship management, partnership development, or key account coordination
- Comfort working with CRM systems, dashboards, and BD analytics tools such as Salesforce, Power BI, Tableau, or similar
- Hands-on experience using generative AI tools such as Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, or similar in real workflows
- India work authorization
- Successful completion of reference checking and employment verification
- Must not be subject to employment restrictions from a former employer that prevent performance of the role
- Responsible and sophisticated use of AI
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The Company
What We Do
Athena Infonomics is a data-driven global consultancy and impact solutions group. The company applies social science research, data analytics, and technology to drive innovation in policy and practice, and to plan, implement, and monitor development interventions to advance global development.
