Vanita Patel
Limited Partner at Operator Collective
Vanita Patel
Limited Partner at Operator Collective
New York City Metropolitan Area
Overview
Work Experience
Worldwide Industries and Partnerships Leader
2021 - Current
Leading the Industry and Strategic Partnership teams to reshape the future of work by building partnerships with innovative companies around the world.
Limited Partner
2022
Operator Collective is a venture fund and dream team community of operator LPs. OpCo brings together 200+ of tech’s most exceptional executives from diverse backgrounds to invest in and supercharge the next generation of enterprise tech.
Founding Limited Partner
2020
Female founders are a force to be reckoned with - and yet are part of an untapped venture capital landscape. We provide the starter fuel and mentoring to propel these fearless women to victory. How Women Invest is dedicated to shifting the venture capital landscape by supporting women-led companies, with a focus on women of color.
Board Member
2022
Publicly elected position. Serving on the Education Committee and Policy Committee.
Board Member
2020
Girls Inc, the oldest girl-centered organization in the US, encourages all girls to be "Strong, Smart, and Bold" through direct service and advocacy. The organization has been transforming girls’ views of themselves and their opportunities for generations through programs that focus on leadership, academic success, health, and financial self‐sufficiency.
Vice President of Sales
2020 - 2021
With $1B in sales, Converge is a 3-year-old Hybrid IT Solution Provider built through acquiring a portfolio of regional companies with infrastructure solutions expertise in advanced analytics, cloud, cybersecurity, and managed services. I was recruited for my expertise as a sales leader and evangelist and to focus on driving 30% of the company’s revenue through strategic partnerships. I am building a growth model for Sales with key product solutions in cloud-enabled technology for the Finance, Healthcare & Retail verticals, and maximize profits by leading sales teams on messaging, cross-selling, building business relationships, and structuring deals to add value to clients.
Vice President of Sales, North America Business Partner Ecosystem
2018 - 2020
In this promotion, I was tasked with driving cross-brand solution sales with the top 25 companies in IBM’s Business Partner Ecosystem, who either resell or embed IBM technology into their products. I delivered $2B in annual revenue with double-digit growth, managing sales across all IBM brands with these partners as we helped them build new solutions and models. I strengthened our partnership and worked with leadership teams to prepare for growth and market shifts in cloud, digital transformation, and artificial intelligence.
Director, Technology Partnerships and Emerging Businesses
2017 - 2018
In this role, I built a new growth engine and global business models for mission-critical sales of Embed technology. Managing a global budget, headcount, and strategy, I delivered more than $1B in annual revenue with double-digit growth. My team included 12 global Directors and Sales Executives and indirectly, another 75 global sales executives, working on embedding and integrating IBM “widgets” into the cloud products that partners were developing. I oversaw IBM’s partnerships for software, systems, and cloud services with more than 8,000 Independent Software Vendors and oversaw 32 technical centers around the world that let companies test IBM technology with theirs in a supported environment. We reimagined sales processes with a new Build with IBM model, a holistic digital try-and-buy experience that led to a blueprint for “lighter” test products and trial versions of the software.
Director, Watson Ecosystem & Strategic Partnerships
2015 - 2017
As IBM’s revolutionary Watson AI was about to launch, I was selected to build the sales engine and lead the sales organization globally. We built an ecosystem meant to thrive outside of the traditional IBM model from scratch, creating a new culture, new teams, and an agile structure to support rapid growth. The team grew from 7 to 150 sales and marketing professionals in two years. I oversaw the onboarding of 300 active partners focused on diverse industries for the new AI offerings and raised awareness through tech conferences, hackathons, and online conversations on AI tools. For this newly created industry, I developed new commercial models to build strategic relationships and pricing models and built an international expansion strategy, beginning in the UK and then Spain and Germany, building teams and working with government technology councils and leaders on driving technology innovation for AI-led solutions.
Director of Sales, Industrial Sector
2014 - 2015
After leading the sales restructuring, I was selected to lead the transformation of sales solutions using Cloud, Analytics, Mobile Social, and Data for industrial customers such as Panasonic, Sony, and Canon. I led a team of seven client executives and created account relationships to deliver $100M in annual revenue and $500M in signings, as well as an $800M global outsourcing deal.
Chief of Staff for General Manager, North America
2012 - 2014
Selected for a highly visible executive development rotational role working for the GM (CEO) of North America, who was responsible for $60B in revenue and every function of the organization. As his extension, I engaged with his 22 executive and sales leadership direct reports, leading from behind within Sales, Strategy, Marketing, Business Development, and Finance, building cross-departmental relationships and learning how to lead a company at scale, and how every 90 days counts and goes fast. I was also tasked with leading a transformational project to restructure the IBM salesforce to a regional model without adding headcount or losing sales efficiency, which became an operational assignment to revamp the go-to-market strategy for IBM’s largest sales organization.
Sales Executive, Data Center Services
2010 - 2012
Drove global technology sales and delivery of Data Center design and build services, responsible for signings, profit, and a $200M revenue goal, overseeing routes to market alliances, resource management, and growth opportunities.
Certified Client Executive, Global Sales & Distribution
2005 - 2010
Promoted to sell and integrate the breadth of IBM’s products, services, and solutions to enterprise customers, managing a $90M pharma territory, signing new outsourcing agreements, and growing revenue.
Brand Specialist & Client Executive Roles
1996 - 2005
My early years at IBM were spent learning about sales and driving sales growth. I won the Rookie of the Year award for North America across all of IBM Sales in my first job; became a Competitive Sales Executive where I generated $25M in revenue and coached other sales executives in selling against the competition; and was Channels Manager of the Systems and Technology Group, building partner relationships in the Public and Financial Sectors.