Startup Program Manager

Join Vonage and help us innovate cloud communications for businesses worldwide!

Why this role matters:

As a Startup Program Manager at Vonage, you’ll lead our startup engagement efforts, identifying high-potential founders, fostering strategic partnerships, and driving early adoption of our high-value APIs. This is a critical role within the Vonage Developer Ecosystem and Engagement team responsible for how we engage and grow the developer community and drive adoption of our API products.

In this role, you will  own this program end to end to drive significant business impact, designing and managing targeted initiatives, from onboarding and incentive programs to events and collaborations, ensuring startups can innovate and scale with Vonage. Working cross-functionally with product, sales, and developer relations, you’ll help uncover breakthrough use cases, boost adoption, and position Vonage as the go-to API partner for the most promising startups across the globe. 

Your key responsibilities:

• Own and execute the program strategy to identify, recruit and retain high-potential startups that can benefit from early adoption of Vonage’s high-value APIs, such as RCS (Messaging) and Silent Auth (Verify).
• Build and maintain strong relationships with founders, accelerators, and startup ecosystem partners to drive program awareness and participation.
• Design and execute onboarding processes, incentive structures, and credit allocations to encourage adoption of multiple Vonage APIs.
• Collaborate with product, sales, and developer relations teams to ensure startups have the technical support and guidance they need to succeed.
• Organize and participate in targeted events, workshops, and partner activations that connect Vonage with innovative startup communities.
• Monitor startup usage and engagement, disbursing incentives in tranches based on milestones, use cases, and performance.
• Gather and share actionable insights on new API applications and emerging market needs to inform product strategy.
• Identify high-potential startups for potential strategic investment opportunities in partnership with organizations such as Ericsson Ventures.

What you’ll bring:

Required:

• 4+ years of experience in large scale program management, partnerships, or ecosystem development, ideally within startups, APIs, or B2B SaaS.
• Proven ability to design and run multi-stage programs with significant and measurable results.
• Strong relationship-building skills, with experience engaging founders, accelerators, and technical stakeholders.
• Excellent communication skills, able to clearly convey technical and business value to diverse audiences.
• Analytical mindset with the ability to track metrics, assess ROI, and optimize program performance.
• Familiarity with developer engagement, API ecosystems, or technical product adoption strategies.

What we consider a plus:

• Existing network within startup ecosystems and experience with venture or accelerator programs.
• Experience speaking at developer conferences, user groups, or meetups.
• Experience running a developer champion, ambassador or similar program.

Where you will work:

This position offers a hybrid work arrangement based out of our Holmdel office, with the flexibility to work remotely. We are also open to considering fully remote candidates located within the Eastern Time Zone of the United States.

Sponsorship is not available. Legal authorization to work in the USA is required. We are unable to sponsor individuals for employment visas, now or in the future, for this job opening. #LI-HB

There’s no perfect candidate. You don't need all the preferred qualifications to make a valuable impact on our team. Our employees and customers come from diverse backgrounds, so if you're passionate about what you could achieve at Vonage, we'd love to hear from you.

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Who we are:

Vonage is a global cloud communications leader. And your talent will further help brands - such as Airbnb, Viber, WhatsApp, and Snapchat - accelerate their digital transformation through our fully programmable-based unified communications, contact center solutions, and communications APIs. Ready to innovate? Then join us today.

Note: The purpose of this profile is to provide a general summary of essential responsibilities for the position and is not meant as an exhaustive list. Assignments may differ for individuals within the same role based on business conditions, departmental need or geographic location.