Founding Account Executive - Simulation Agent at Clera

About The Role

ABOUT THE ROLE

This is a founding sales hire at an early-stage AI software company building an intelligent agent for hardware engineering workflows, including CAD, simulation, and PLM. You will own the full new-logo sales motion from day one, turning early wins into the repeatable playbook that future sellers will inherit. The role sits directly alongside the founding team and carries real influence over go-to-market strategy and product direction.

WHAT YOU'LL DO

Own the full sales cycle from outbound prospecting through close for net-new accounts, without SDR or BDR support.
Convert warm founder-sourced opportunities and inbound interest into closed deals while simultaneously building new pipeline.
Demo the simulation agent solo and design technical evaluations that validate value inside customer models and workflows.
Navigate complex buying committees, aligning CAE and simulation champions with VP- and Director-level economic buyers.
Run target account plans against teams that currently use major simulation platforms such as ANSYS, SIMULIA, Altair, or Simcenter.
Create qualification criteria, discovery frameworks, evaluation templates, and objection-handling guides that become the company playbook.
Feed deal learnings back to the product team to improve the agent and future sales motions.

WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR

6+ years of full-cycle hunting in complex, technical B2B deals into engineering or manufacturing organizations, with a verifiable track record of sourcing and closing net-new logos against quota.
At least half of quota history from net-new logo acquisition rather than renewals or expansion.
Proven ability to run unaided software demos and technical evaluations with engineering teams, without relying on a solutions engineer.
Fluency with AI agents and LLMs, including the ability to articulate concrete engineering value and constraints of agentic workflows in CAE and simulation contexts.
Direct experience selling into environments that use major CAE or simulation platforms (ANSYS, SIMULIA, Altair, Siemens Simcenter, or equivalent), whether as a vendor rep, reseller, or competitor.
Background selling CAD, CAE, PLM, EDA, or adjacent deep-tech (dev tools, MLOps, infrastructure) into large enterprises, with strong domain fluency.
Founding-hire temperament: comfortable building a go-to-market motion from scratch, owning ambiguity, and moving fast without an established support structure.
Prior experience as an early or founding sales hire is a strong plus.
Background in mechanical, aerospace, or a related engineering discipline, or strong domain language to hold credible technical conversations, is a bonus.