Director of Business Development, Data Centers

Compensation
OTE $200k–$450k, heavily commission-based on closed deals, plus competitive equity. Reports directly to the CEO. Anywhere in the US, with travel expected.

Why this matters
Communities are pushing back on data centers, and water is one of the biggest reasons. To advance AI infrastructure alongside the communities that host it, we need a new, flexible and fast on-the-ground way to supply water.

About Aquaria
Aquaria builds modular systems that make water from air. We’ve deployed 500+ systems and produced 7M+ gallons. We’re now building toward the world’s first zero-aquifer data centers, supplied by water from the air instead of the community’s supply. HydroGrid brings that to infrastructure scale for data centers, and HydroPak delivers water for the communities around them.

The role
You’re a senior, hands-on builder who personally creates and runs Aquaria’s data center business nationwide from day one. You find the right accounts, get in the room, win the technical review, and carry each opportunity through to signed commitments, pilots and delivery. Our public-affairs partner opens doors and supports regulatory and community strategy; you own every step after the intro.

You’re semi-technical and commercially relentless. You understand how data centers are designed, permitted, cooled and procured well enough to earn trust with facilities, MEP and sustainability teams, and you close with the developers and operators who make the call. You use AI to move fast and measure yourself by signed results.

What you own
- The national data center pipeline end to end: hyperscalers, colocation operators, developers, and the engineering, EPC and community stakeholders around each deal.
- Turning interest into site-specific proposals, LOIs, paid pilots and signed agreements across HydroGrid and HydroPak.
- The technical sales conversation (integration, uptime and redundancy, heat and energy, water yield, install), with our engineers alongside you when needed.
- A clear map of each account’s buying path: who writes the standard, who permits the site, who owns CapEx and OpEx, and who signs.
- Close coordination with the CEO, public affairs, product and engineering, plus a forecast that reflects reality.

Your first six months
First 30 days
- Learn the product, the data center water problem and the live pipeline well enough to lead customer meetings.
- Build a ranked national account list with named stakeholders and a path to close for each.
- Turn current conversations into site-specific next steps.

First 3–6 months
- Run a repeatable first meeting, NDA and technical review process with the materials technical buyers need.
- Land the first signed commitments that prove demand, such as LOIs, paid pilots or delivery agreements, with a clear path to HydroGrid deployment.
- Bring operator requirements back into the product so we build what gets specified and approved.

Requirements

Must-haves
- A proven record of selling or advancing complex cooling, water, thermal, power or mission-critical infrastructure into data centers or a close neighboring industry.
- Enough technical depth to lead a skeptical engineering meeting.
- Long, multi-stakeholder deals personally carried to a signed outcome.
- Ownership of the full cycle: you write the brief, run the meeting, send the follow-up and keep the forecast honest.
- High agency, high output and a willingness to travel.
- A personal commitment to making data center growth work for communities and their water.

Nice-to-haves
- Experience at a cooling, water-treatment or power OEM, or inside a hyperscaler, colo or developer.
- Familiarity with procurement and vendor qualification, such as approved-vendor lists, RFQs and supplier onboarding.
- Experience with permitting, community or regulatory work around water, land or energy.
- A national network among data center developers, operators and MEP firms.
- Fluency with AI tools.

Signals of the right person
- They can walk through a real deal: who was in the room, what almost stopped it, and how they got it signed.
- They speak in site-specific terms, such as water source, permits, cooling design and timeline.
- They’ve personally done the work.
- They push for more quality touches and tighter conversion.

Benefits

OTE $200k–$450k, heavily commission-based on closed deals, plus competitive equity. Reports directly to the CEO. Anywhere in the US, with travel expected.