Job Description
Position Summary
The Vice President, Head of Technology Partnerships & Vendor Engagement will serve as a strategic leader responsible for building, managing, and optimizing FIS's ecosystem of technology partners, platform integrations, and strategic vendor relationships. This executive role bridges enterprise technology strategy with commercial outcomes — driving innovation, reducing total cost of ownership, and ensuring that FIS's partner network creates measurable value across Banking Solutions, Capital Markets, and Payment Solutions business units.
The ideal candidate brings deep fintech industry knowledge, a strong executive presence, and a track record of building high-performing partnership programs that accelerate product roadmaps and strengthen FIS's competitive position in the market.
Key Responsibilities:
Strategic Partnership Development
- Define and execute FIS's global technology partnership strategy in alignment with enterprise product and platform objectives.
- Identify, evaluate, and onboard high-value technology partners — including ISVs, cloud providers, API platform vendors, and fintech innovators.
- Develop joint go-to-market (GTM) strategies with key partners to expand FIS's addressable market and drive incremental revenue.
- Negotiate and structure complex partnership agreements, co-development arrangements, and technology licensing deals.
Vendor Engagement & Governance
- Oversee enterprise vendor lifecycle management — from sourcing and due diligence through contracting, performance management, and renewal or exit.
- Establish a vendor governance framework with clear KPIs, SLAs, risk tiering, and executive escalation paths.
- Partner with Procurement, Legal, Risk, and Compliance teams to ensure vendor relationships meet regulatory, security, and operational standards.
- Drive rationalization of the vendor portfolio to eliminate redundancy and optimize spend across technology categories.
Technology Ecosystem & Integration
- Collaborate with CTO, Product, and Engineering organizations to align partner capabilities with FIS platform architecture and integration strategy.
- Champion API-first and open banking partnership models to accelerate FIS's ecosystem connectivity and developer adoption.
- Evaluate emerging technology vendors (AI/ML, cloud infrastructure, data analytics, cybersecurity) to inform strategic roadmap investments.
- Track market trends, competitor partnership activity, and disruptive technologies to ensure FIS maintains a differentiated partner ecosystem.
Executive Leadership & Stakeholder Influence
- Build, lead, and develop a high-performing team of partnership managers, vendor relationship managers, and alliance directors.
- Present partnership strategy, portfolio health, and vendor risk posture to C-suite, Board, and business unit leaders.
- Serve as primary executive sponsor for Tier 1 partner relationships, representing FIS at industry forums, partner councils, and executive briefings.
- Foster a culture of accountability, innovation, and continuous improvement within the partnerships function.
Required Qualifications
- 15+ years of progressive experience in technology partnerships, alliance management, vendor strategy, or enterprise business development within financial services or fintech.
- Demonstrated success leading a corporate partnerships or vendor management function at VP level or above in a large-scale technology organization.
- Deep understanding of financial services technology — payments, banking platforms, capital markets infrastructure, or adjacent domains.
- Proven ability to negotiate and close complex, multi-year enterprise agreements with technology vendors and strategic partners.
- Strong executive presence with the ability to influence and align senior stakeholders across Product, Engineering, Legal, Risk, and Finance.
- Experience managing distributed, high-performing teams across global geographies.
- Bachelor's degree in business, Technology, or a related field required; MBA or advanced degree strongly preferred.
Preferred Qualifications
- Prior experience at a Tier 1 financial technology company, payment network, or global financial institution.
- Familiarity with open banking, embedded finance, cloud-native infrastructure, or AI/ML technology vendor landscapes.
- Experience with third-party risk management (TPRM) frameworks and regulatory expectations for vendor oversight in financial services.
- Track record of building and scaling strategic alliance programs that generated measurable revenue or product acceleration outcomes.
- Network of established relationships across major cloud providers (AWS, Azure, GCP), core banking vendors, and fintech platforms.
Core Competencies
✦ Strategic Vision & Executive Influence
✦ Commercial Acumen & Deal Structuring
✦ Technology Ecosystem Fluency
✦ Vendor Risk & Governance Expertise
✦ Partnership & Relationship Development
✦ Team Leadership & Talent Development
✦ Cross-Functional Collaboration
✦ Data-Driven Decision Making
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EEOC Statement
FIS is an equal opportunity employer. We evaluate qualified applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, genetic information, national origin, disability, veteran status, and other protected characteristics. The EEO is the Law poster is available here supplement document available here
For positions located in the US, the following conditions apply. If you are made a conditional offer of employment, you will be required to undergo a drug test. ADA Disclaimer: In developing this job description care was taken to include all competencies needed to successfully perform in this position. However, for Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) purposes, the essential functions of the job may or may not have been described for purposes of ADA reasonable accommodation. All reasonable accommodation requests will be reviewed and evaluated on a case-by-case basis.
Sourcing Model
Recruitment at FIS works primarily on a direct sourcing model; a relatively small portion of our hiring is through recruitment agencies. FIS does not accept resumes from recruitment agencies which are not on the preferred supplier list and is not responsible for any related fees for resumes submitted to job postings, our employees, or any other part of our company.
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