Account Executive, Bay Area — AI & Agentic Security

Operant AI | San Francisco Bay Area (Hybrid) | Account Executive

About Operant AI

Operant AI is the industry's most comprehensive real-time security platform for AI, Agents, and MCP. Recognized across six Gartner critical AI security reports — including AI TRiSM, MCP Gateways, API Protection, and Securing Custom-Built AI Agents — Operant is the category-defining company protecting the agentic AI era. Our platform delivers real-time discovery, detection, and defense across the full AI stack: LLM APIs, MCP servers and clients, autonomous agents, and the APIs they depend on.

Founded by former Apple, VMware, and Google executives and backed by Felicis and SineWave Ventures, we're a fast-moving team on a mission to make AI innovation safe at scale.

The Role

We're looking for an Account Executive, West Coast based in the San Francisco Bay Area who lives at the intersection of cybersecurity and AI — someone who can walk into a CISO's office and talk prompt injection, and then walk into an AI platform team and talk agentic workflows and MCP tool poisoning. This is a quota-carrying, “roll up your sleeves,” field-oriented role selling Operant's AI Gatekeeper, MCP Gateway, and Agent Protector products to enterprise and high-growth tech companies across the Bay Area and broader West Coast.

You will own the full sales cycle for your account list — from prospecting and discovery through technical validation and close — and will work closely with Solutions Engineering, Product, and Marketing to drive pipeline and revenue in your territory, while maintaining brand equity and customer trust by speaking expertly about the product and the industry with in-the-know buyers and teams who already have strong knowledge in the space. You should be able to clearly articulate the exceptional differentiation that Operant’s products provide in the market and operate with a shortened sales cycle that is in-line with the speed of the AI boom in SF (not a multi-year long traditional cyber sales cycle with multi-month long POCs) and cultivate and close highly qualified ICP leads, both inbound and outbound, who have already demonstrated urgency in filling open budget items and solving identified, critical security problems that are affecting their business-critical AI road maps, development, and growth goals.

What You'll Do

• Own and grow a Bay Area-anchored territory, targeting enterprise security buyers across industries including tech, financial services, healthcare, and defense.
• Drive net-new ARR by identifying and closing opportunities for Operant's AI Gatekeeper, MCP Gateway, and Agent Protector solutions, as well as new solutions launching multiple times per quarter. The ability to quickly get up to speed on new product and feature launches is critical.
• Navigate complex, multi-stakeholder sales cycles involving CISOs, AI/ML platform leads, security architects, and DevOps teams.
• Translate highly technical concepts — MCP security, agentic risk, runtime AI defense, non-human identity (NHI) controls — into clear business value for executive audiences.
• Partner with Solutions Engineers on technical deep-dives, POCs, and proof-of-value engagements, while still being able to converse at a technical level with technical CISO’s, VPs of engineering, and heads of AI who start first conversations with phrases like, “Don’t waste my time with marketing speak, just tell me if you can do x, y, or z and how long will it take.” You must be able to answer those questions yourself without passing it over immediately to a Sales Engineer. 
• Develop and manage a healthy pipeline with accurate forecasting in CRM (Apollo, Hubspot).
• Represent Operant AI at Bay Area and West Coast conferences, industry events, and executive briefings.
• Collaborate with channel and alliance partners to expand reach and accelerate deals.

What You Bring

Experience

• 3-5 years of B2B sales experience, with a track record of closing enterprise cybersecurity deals.
• Demonstrable experience selling cybersecurity solutions — ideally in runtime security, API security, cloud security, or AI/ML security.
• Working knowledge of AI and agentic systems — you understand what LLMs, AI agents, and MCP are, and why they introduce new attack surfaces.
• Experience selling to security personas (CISO, SecOps, AppSec) and technical platform personas (AI/ML leads, DevSecOps, platform engineering).
• Proven ability to run a full sales cycle independently in a fast-paced, early-stage environment.

Skills

• Strong technical acumen — you can hold your own in conversations about prompt injection, zero-trust, API security, and agentic AI without needing an SE in every meeting.
• Excellent discovery and value-selling skills; you ask great questions and connect product capability to customer pain.
• Clear, concise communicator — in writing, in decks, and in the room.
• Comfortable with ambiguity and motivated by building in a category-creating environment.
• Passionate lifelong learner who proactively self-teaches to stay in the know about technology and the industry at the absolute forefront of AI and Agentic development, and is able to translate that knowledge into pragmatic and empathetic understanding of the problems the buyers are trying to solve and how those problems impact end-users and real people.

Preferred

• Prior experience at a cybersecurity startup or category-defining security vendor.
• Familiarity with the AI security landscape — AI TRiSM, OWASP Top 10 for LLMs, MCP, and related frameworks.
• Existing relationships with West Coast enterprise security or AI platform teams.
• Bachelor's degree in a relevant field, or equivalent experience.

Why Operant

• Category leadership: The only vendor featured across six Gartner AI security reports in the last year alone — you'll be selling into genuine market demand with analyst-validated air cover.
• Right timing: MCP and agentic AI adoption is exploding. You'll be ahead of the wave, not chasing it.
• Compelling product: Runtime defense that actually works — real-time blocking, inline data redaction, and zero-trust enforcement built for AI agents.
• Mission-driven team: Founded by operators from Apple, VMware, and Google who've built at scale before.
• Competitive compensation: Base salary + uncapped commission + equity + full benefits.