Director, dsai industry & external partnerships (johns hopkins technology ventures)

Johns Hopkins Technology Ventures (JHTV) supports the translation of university research through technology licensing, sponsored research agreements, and venture creation across all ten schools of the university. We serve as business advisors to faculty whose research has commercial potential, with resources spanning IP protection, technology analysis, venture funding, and the FastForward innovation hubs. Johns Hopkins Data Science and AI Institute (DSAI) — the university’s strategic investment in data science and AI — represents a concentrated pipeline of translatable software and AI research, carried forward by an expanding faculty cohort with strong industry experience and external recognition.

We are seeking a Director, DSAI Industry & External Partnerships who will serve as a senior individual dedicated to building the external pipeline supporting the translation of DSAI research into real world impact. The Director plays a critical role as the connective tissue between DSAI’s faculty and the companies, foundations, and public sector entities that can absorb, fund, co-develop, and deploy DSAI’s work. Translation, as DSAI and JHTV define it, spans commercial, financial, and societal impact: the role is responsible for brokering a high-impact public-good partnership (in the spirit of the COVID Map) as for identifying opportunities for sponsored research, corporate affiliate programs or enterprise licenses. The Director is not a generalist account manager — they are a strategist who understands AI and data science deeply enough to earn faculty trust and industry credibility in the same conversation.

The Director reports to JHTV leadership as part of the DSAI translation team and has close day-to-day alignment with DSAI leadership. The Director also coordinates closely with JHTV’s Corporate Partnerships team and the Technology Transfer team, which retain authority over deal execution, contracting, and legal review in their respective scopes. In this role, the Director opens doors, maps the external partner landscape, and advances partner relationships either all the way through to an agreement in novel forms of collaborations or to the point of handoff where established processes exist — and then stays engaged to ensure translation outcomes materialize.

This is the first corporate engagement hire for DSAI. As such, we seek someone with creativity and entrepreneurial builder instincts to act both as an individual contributor and as a partner with DSAI and JHTV leadership to determine how this function and potentially larger team should build out over time.

Specific Duties & Responsibilities

External Relationship Development

• Map the industry, foundation, and government landscape tied to DSAI’s research strengths, identifying high-potential partners across sectors.
• Build and steward a portfolio of active relationships with corporate R&D leaders, foundation program officers, federal agency contacts (NIH, NSF, DARPA, ARPA-H, and others), and other strategic investors.
• Cultivate durable partnerships — not one-off transactions — by maintaining consistent engagement with decision-makers before, after, and between deals.
• Serve as DSAI’s primary external-facing relationship professional, enabling faculty to engage at the research level while the Director manages the commercial and institutional relationship.
• Represent JHTV and DSAI at industry convenings, conferences, and ecosystem events relevant to AI, data science, and the sector verticals where DSAI has strength.

Translation Pipeline — Commercial and Societal

• Identify and advance opportunities for sponsored research, co-development agreements, enterprise licensing, and strategic partnerships that match DSAI’s capabilities to external demand.
• Identify and advance opportunities for foundation- and government-backed translation partnerships on high-impact public-good projects where the translation outcome is societal rather than commercial.
• Work with DSAI’s translation team and FastForward Venture Builders to align external relationship activity with the Studio pipeline — surfacing industry partners for Studio Projects and Studio Companies at the right stage.
• Track relationships and pipeline systematically; report on deal activity, partner engagement, and translation outcomes to JHTV and DSAI leadership.

JHTV Coordination & Deal Handoff

• Work in close coordination with JHTV’s Corporate Partnerships team to ensure DSAI-sourced relationships connect to the full JHTV deal infrastructure.
• Uncover new models of industry engagement. In those scenarios, the work is highly creative and entrepreneurial and the Director will need to navigate, with the support of JHTV and DSAI leadership, the various institutional stakeholders needed to establish those new models both structurally and contractually.
• Leverage established teams to move deals forward expeditiously where opportunities are identified that fit into our current corporate sponsored research or licensing frameworks.
• Maintain active involvement through and after deal close to ensure that the translation outcome — not just the agreement — is realized.
• Surface patterns in external demand, industry interest, and partner feedback to DSAI and JHTV leadership to inform hiring, portfolio prioritization, and strategy.

Faculty Engagement & Translation Culture

• Build strong, trusted relationships with DSAI faculty — particularly those with industry-facing research — so that the Director becomes a natural first call when faculty see commercial or partnership potential.
• Work with the DSAI translation team to identify which faculty projects have near-term external partnership potential and prioritize relationship-building accordingly.
• Help faculty understand what external partners need — in terms of proof points, timelines, and IP clarity — and coach them through the early stages of external engagement.
• Other duties as assigned.

Minimum Qualifications

• Advanced Degree in a technical field (computer science, data science, engineering, or related), or an MBA with a strong technical undergraduate background.
• Eight or more years’ experience in corporate partnerships, business development, or technology licensing in an industry, research institution, or government/foundation setting, with a track record of initiating and closing complex research or technology agreements.
• Additional education may substitute for required experience, and additional related experience may substitute for required education beyond a high school diploma/graduation equivalent, to the extent permitted by the JHU equivalency formula.

Preferred Qualifications

• U.S. Citizen or legal permanent resident required due to Federal Export Controls.
• Demonstrated ability to build and manage senior-level external relationships — with corporate R&D leaders, foundation program officers, or government agency contacts — in a technical or research-intensive context.
• Sufficient fluency in AI and data science to hold credible conversations with DSAI faculty and their industry counterparts without requiring deep technical translation from others.
• Direct experience structuring sponsored research agreements, co-development agreements, or enterprise licensing deals for software or AI technologies.
• Existing relationships with corporate AI/data science R&D organizations, health-sector technology buyers, or federal agency program officers relevant to DSAI’s research areas.
• Experience building new models of corporate engagement, consortiums or partnership structures is strongly preferred.
• Familiarity with the full DSAI translation spectrum — from equity-backed spinouts to foundation-funded public-good projects — and comfort working across both.
• Experience working in or closely with a startup studio, accelerator, or venture-building function is a plus.

Technical qualifications and specialized certifications

• No specialized certifications required.
• Proficiency with CRM tools and relationship management systems preferred.
• Familiarity with AI/ML research workflows, data licensing norms, and the academic research commercialization ecosystem is strongly preferred.

Technical Skills and Expected Level of Proficiency

• Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Software Commercialization Expertise - Authority
• Business Development - Intermediate
• Intellectual Property Strategy - Intermediate
• Market Intelligence and Competitive Analysis - Authority
• Oral and written communications - Intermediate
• Partner Relationship Management - Intermediate
• Presentations - Intermediate
• Program Development - Intermediate
• Project Management - Intermediate

The core technical skills listed are most essential; additional technical skills may be required based on specific division or department needs.