Principal AI Sales Specialist

Cohesity is a leader in AI-powered data security and management. Aided by an extensive ecosystem of partners, Cohesity makes it easy to secure, protect, manage, and get value from data — across the data center, edge, and cloud. Cohesity helps organizations defend against cybersecurity threats with comprehensive data security and management capabilities, including immutable backup snapshots, AI-based threat detection, monitoring for malicious behavior, and rapid recovery at scale.
We’ve been named a Leader by multiple analyst firms and have been globally recognized for Innovation, Product Strength, and Simplicity in Design.
Join us on our mission to shape the future of our industry.

GAIA is Cohesity’s enterprise AI platform for unlocking the value of unstructured data across the Cohesity Data Cloud. It helps customers securely search, understand, summarize, and reason across current and historical enterprise information, while preserving permissions, provenance, and governance. GAIA also provides a foundation for agentic AI by making trusted enterprise context available to AI applications, copilots, and agents - helping customers move from simply protecting data to using it as a strategic source of intelligence and action. 

Why now: This role is a founding GTM role in Cohesity's new AI Business Unit. GAIA is where the market is heading - enterprises secured their data with us; now they want to activate it for AI. You'll build the sales playbook on top of 13,000 existing customers and co-sell muscle from NVIDIA and the hyperscalers, carrying a brand-new number in a market that's just opening. Ground floor, executive air cover, and a partner ecosystem already generating pipeline. 

HOW YOU’LL SPEND YOUR TIME HERE: 

• Own GAIA revenue number across product/infrastructure and consulting-advisory bookings for your territory — you generate it, you carry it, you close it. 

• Be the AI subject-matter resource in every deal you touch — data architecture, use cases, deployment models, and the business case behind them, credible enough to hold the room with a CAIO, CDO, or VP of AI. 

• Build pipeline, Partner with marketing, SDRs, and field sales, but don't wait on them — daily and weekly outbound across multiple channels is part of the job, not a fallback. 

• Identify, qualify, develop, and close AI opportunities by working existing field relationships and building new ones with your own network. 

• Build and deliver executive-quality pitch decks, proposals, and business cases that translate the technology into a value story specific to the account — not a template with a logo swapped in. 

• Blend product/infrastructure opportunities with consulting and advisory engagements into multi-phase account plans — the first deal should set up the next one. 

• Work the AI partner ecosystem for your region — NVIDIA, the hyperscalers, infrastructure OEMs, and emerging AI vendors — for joint pipeline, co-sell motion, and deal registration. 

• Run disciplined pipeline hygiene: accurate CRM, honest stage progression, forecasts people can plan against. 

• Show up in cadence calls and pipeline reviews with something useful — market intel, competitive read, what worked and what didn't — not just a status update. 

WE’D LOVE TO TALK TO YOU IF YOU HAVE MANY OF THE FOLLOWING: 

• 10-12 years of quota-carrying technology sales experience, including time in a specialist selling role, with 2-3 years specifically selling AI products to VP of AI, CAIO, CDO, or equivalent buyers. 

• Infrastructure selling experience — you know what it takes to get a platform decision made, not just a point-tool purchase. 

• A demonstrated track record generating your own pipeline in complex, multi-stakeholder enterprise accounts — hunter, not order-taker. 

• Working fluency in the AI landscape: platforms, deployment models, use cases, value drivers, and where the risk actually sits. This is a business-value and consultative-selling role, not a hands-on technical practitioner seat. 

• Experience selling both product/infrastructure and consulting-advisory engagements to enterprise, data-driven, or high-growth technology customers. 

• Proven ability to build and deliver executive-grade decks and proposals that hold up in front of a buying committee. 

• Comfort operating in a co-sell / specialist model — you drive the AI motion, field account teams own the primary relationship, and you make that partnership work. 

• Disciplined CRM and forecasting habits. If it's not in the system, it doesn't count. 

• Bachelor's degree required. 
• Demonstrated ability to leverage AI tools to enhance productivity, streamline workflows, and support decision making.
• Professional English language proficiency for customer and internal communication.

WE ARE EXTRA EXCITED IF YOU HAVE ANY OF THE FOLLOWING: 

• Existing relationships with CAIOs, CDOs, or VP-of-AI buyers at Fortune 500 or high-growth East Coast enterprises. 

• Prior specialist overlay experience at a data infrastructure, cloud, or AI platform vendor. 

• Comfort working a co-sell motion with NVIDIA, AWS, Azure, or GCP field teams. 

• Language capability matched to the assigned territory (e.g., Arabic for Emerging/Gulf accounts, Mandarin/Cantonese for APJ) is strongly preferred; business-level English is required for all positions. 

HOW YOU WILL BE MEASURED: 

• Attainment of assigned AI revenue quota across product, infrastructure, and consulting/advisory bookings. 

• Pipeline generation volume, velocity, and conversion against regional targets, plus growth in account participation. 

• Services attach on AI engagements — labs, deployment, consulting/advisory — that build multi-phase account plans. 

• Field collaboration: joint pipeline generated with account teams, inclusion in account planning, field satisfaction. 

• Partner co-sell: deal registrations earned, joint pipeline built with AI partner sales teams, win-rate impact. 

• Win rate on competitive deals you led the pitch on. 

• CRM accuracy and forecast reliability. 

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Disclosure Pursuant to Applicable State Equal Pay Transparency Laws - This position has a starting pay range as listed below. Actual salary depends upon many factors, including a candidate’s skills, qualifications and experience, location, and salary expectations, and therefore a starting salary at the low end, high end, or even above the stated range may be offered. This position may also be eligible for bonus compensation, commission (if in a sales function), and/or equity grants. Additionally, full-time employees are eligible to participate in our comprehensive benefits framework, including health and wellness benefits, vacation, paid holidays and refresh days, 401(k) retirement plan, life and disability insurance coverages, and other benefits the Company may offer from time to time.

The compensation noted above is based on an annualized hourly rate assuming normal full-time employment.

Current pay transparency shows the OTE (On-Target Earnings) for commission-based roles.

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Equal Employment Opportunity Employer (EEOE)
Cohesity is an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, creed, religion, sex, sexual orientation, national origin or nationality, ancestry, age, disability, gender identity or expression, marital status, veteran status or any other category protected by law.
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In-Office Expectations
Cohesity employees who are within a reasonable commute (e.g. within a forty-five (45) minute average travel time) work out of our core offices 2-3 days a week of their choosing.

We strongly prefer candidates who are currently located in or near the designated job location. Candidates outside the area should apply only if they are committed to relocating prior to their start date and have the legal right to work in the job location.