About Us
At Quartermaster AI, we leverage cutting-edge AI and robotics technology to enhance maritime domain awareness. Our mission is to become the eyes, ears, and brain of the ocean by enabling every vessel to collaboratively sense, compute, and communicate. Quartermaster is a venture-backed Maritime Domain Awareness company providing near real-time insights to government and commercial partners via our SmartMast™ product. SmartMast™ is a COTS sensor system consisting of a camera, a software defined radio, and a proprietary onboard AI component installed on vessels worldwide and managed by Quartermaster.
About the Role
As a Launcher for Asia, you will carry out Quartermaster's market entry across one of the world's busiest and most strategically important maritime regions. Reporting to the Head of Launch, Asia, you will turn regional strategy into results on the ground: obtaining regulatory approval for deployment, securing vessels, and getting SmartMast™ hardware deployed. This is a hands-on, execution-focused role that sits between our regional leadership, local partners, and Field Operations. Success in this role is measured in markets opened, and SmartMast™ units installed, activated, and reporting across Asia's waters.
What you'll own
Regulatory & Compliance Support
•Government & Regulatory Liaison: Support the Head of Launch in building relationships with national maritime authorities, coast guards, and port authorities, and manage day-to-day working contacts with them.
•Compliance Execution: Prepare and track the filings, permits, and approvals each launch requires, working with Legal and Compliance on customs, trade, spectrum and equipment type-approval, data handling, and maritime safety requirements.
•Regulatory Monitoring: Track policy changes across the region's regulatory regimes pertinent to operation of SmartMast™.
Market Entry Execution
•Playbook Execution: Carry out market entry playbooks in assigned markets, adapting them to local conditions and reporting what works and what does not.
•Import & Logistics: Manage the import, customs, and logistics steps that bring SmartMast™ hardware into target markets, including warehousing and staging ahead of deployment.
•Vendor Management: Source, vet, and manage local installers, fabricators, and port-side vendors to Quartermaster's quality and safety standards.
Maritime Stakeholder Engagement
•Vessel Sourcing: Identify and engage commercial fleet operators, fishing fleets, independent vessel owners, and port authorities suitable for SmartMast™ deployment, and build a pipeline of vessels.
•Agreement Support: Prepare and negotiate partnership and space-use agreements (the right to mount and operate our hardware on a vessel), closing deals within the terms set by the Head of Launch.
•Partner Onboarding: Move signed partners to installation, coordinating with Field Operations so vessels are ready and deployments run without delay.
•Relationship Management: Serve as the day-to-day point of contact for fleets, ports, and vendors in assigned markets, keeping partners engaged after installation.
Reporting & Coordination
•Launch Tracking: Maintain accurate records of pipeline, agreements, installs, and activations, and report progress to the Head of Launch.
•Cross-Functional Coordination: Work with product, engineering, legal, and marketing teams to resolve issues that block launches in assigned markets.
•Market Intelligence: Gather local insight on regional dynamics, technical requirements, and localized risks to inform regional strategy.
What you need
•Experience: 5+ years in operations, market entry, business development, or government relations roles, ideally within maritime, logistics, defense, or other highly regulated sectors.
•Regional Expertise: Working knowledge of the political, regulatory, and commercial landscape across Asia's ports and maritime economies.
•Stakeholder Skills: Experience working with government agencies, port authorities, or fleet operators, and building trust with local partners.
•Commercial Skills: Track record of sourcing and closing B2B agreements, vendor contracts, or fleet partnerships.
•Execution Focus: A bias for action. Comfortable managing several launch workstreams at once, in the field and at a desk.
•Travel: Willingness to travel frequently across the region, including to ports and vessels.
•Language Skills: Fluency in English is required. Professional proficiency in Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, Bahasa Indonesia, Tagalog, or Vietnamese is highly preferred.