Head of AI Ecosystem Intelligence

Holtzbrinck is one of the world's leading media companies, home to Springer Nature, Macmillan Publishers, Macmillan Learning, DIE ZEIT, and Digital Science. Our portfolio spans science, education, literature, and journalism, with over 14,000 employees in more than 120 countries and over USD 4 billion in revenue.

About the role

Based in San Francisco, the AI Hub sits at the intersection of a global media group and the world's most vibrant AI ecosystem. We shape the group's AI strategy, build partnerships with leading AI labs, run programs that grow AI capability across our companies, and invest in what comes next. You will work directly with the Executive Board, leaders, and builders across the portfolio, growing our network across AI labs, startups, VCs, and academia. You will understand our strategic priorities and find the people who share them—whether as participants for our events, partners, or founders. When the right format doesn’t exist yet, you’ll create it: a dinner series, a hackathon, a summit. This role is based at our office at 44 Montgomery Street in San Francisco, with regular presence across the Bay Area ecosystem. On-the-ground attendance is a core requirement.

Responsibilities

• Build and maintain an actively managed network across the Bay Area AI ecosystem, relevant to Holtzbrinck’s sectors and tracked systematically
• Draft regular ecosystem and investment insight briefings for the Executive Board and portfolio leadership teams
• Source, screen, and brief startup opportunities that feed the Hub's investment decisions
• Make targeted matches: connect portfolio companies with the builders, tools, and partners they actually need
• Feed frontline intelligence (trends, signals, deal flow, who's building what) into the team's briefings and investment analyses
• Represent Holtzbrinck with founders, researchers, and investors, and bring the best of them to our table

What Success Looks Like

• A living, CRM-tracked network across labs, startups, VCs, and academia that surfaces insights and leads to collaboration
• A steady flow of qualified, screened startups reaches the investment pipeline, with several advancing to serious diligence in year one
• Founder scouting for our entrepreneur-in-residence program
• Your work shapes how the group’s leaders and builders think about AI
• Portfolio CEOs cite introductions you made as the origin of pilots, partnerships, or deals
• Founders and investors know Holtzbrinck as a serious ecosystem player

Requirements

• Robust relationships across the Bay Area AI ecosystem, spanning AI Labs, big tech, startups and builders, investors, and academia, or a track record that proves you can build them fast
• A track record in venture capital, strategy, startup BD, or an ecosystem role
• Technical fluency: you've built with AI tools and can read a demo critically
• Genuine dedication to science, education, and/or media, and the eagerness to deeply understand Holtzbrinck's strategy
• Strong analytical thinking and communication skills: you turn frontline signals into strategic insights for executive audiences while speaking the language of builders
• Signal over noise: you distill twenty conversations into takeaways the team can act on

Pay

The salary range for this role is $157,000 - $191,000.