---
title: 'Associate Director of Strategic Partnerships at Zilch'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/associate-director-of-strategic-partnerships-zilch-zilch-d5p9kry7v34z'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-09-13'
---

# Associate Director of Strategic Partnerships at Zilch

- **Company:** Zilch
- **Location:** Zilch, United Kingdom
- **Employment:** full-time
- **Work type:** hybrid
- **Posted:** 2026-06-30
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-13
- **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/zilch/74179ccb-9627-4ef0-889d-31f4f475e21b/application

**Skills:** Commercial modelling, Deal structuring, Embedded finance, Co-brands, Integrations, Financial infrastructure licensing, Strategy, Management consulting, Enterprise partnerships, Business development

> Zilch seeks a Director of Strategic Partnerships to build its external partnership pipeline from scratch. The role involves originating, structuring, and closing complex, high-value commercial agreements across fintech and retail sectors while operating at the C-suite level.

## Job description

Who we are: We're one of Europe's fastest-growing fintech companies – on a mission to create the world's most empowering way to pay. We launched the product in 2020 and achieved double unicorn status, valued at $2 billion, and since then have taken on more than 6 million customers.

Our mission is to become the best way to pay for anything, anywhere and say goodbye to credit costs for everyone. This is huge. Want to join us? About the role: We're looking for someone who can build Zilch's external partnership strategy from the ground up, not someone who manages a partner roster they've inherited, and not someone who only closes deals other people have framed up.

You'll work out who Zilch should be aligned with and why, build the commercial logic for that, and then see it through: proposals, business cases, and working with Product, Finance and Compliance to actually bring a partnership to life. You won't be expected to arrive with a black book of contacts ready to close, we can teach deal mechanics. What we can't teach is the judgement to spot the right partnership and the rigour to structure it properly.

You'll operate across two parallel tracks: accelerating distribution of Zilch's existing proposition through embedded, high-value partner relationships, and building new revenue streams by licensing Zilch's core capabilities into new products, models and markets. You'll work directly with the VP of Partnerships, with high visibility into the C-suite.

The strategy doesn't exist yet. If you've spent your career running other people's playbooks, this isn't the right role. If you're someone who can look at a market, work out where Zilch has a right to win, and build the thinking and the relationships from scratch, read on

Day to day responsibilities Strategy and market thesis

- Mapping the market: financial services, fintech, payments infrastructure, retail, platforms and beyond to identify which partnership categories genuinely fit Zilch's brand and commercial position, using your own judgement rather than a provided list
- Building a clear point of view on who we should be partnering with and why, and translating that into a prioritised strategy
- Iterating that strategy as you learn what works, rather than treating the first draft as fixed

Proposal development and deal structuring

- Building commercial proposals and business cases from scratch — defining the model, sizing the opportunity, and making the argument internally and externally
- Structuring novel commercial arrangements: embedded finance, co-brands, integrations and others
- Working with Legal, Finance, Product and Engineering to bring deals to life without losing momentum — this is as much about internal orchestration as external negotiation

Relationship building and execution

- Originating relationships at senior and C-suite level, building credibility as a serious commercial counterpart
- Owning flagship partnerships through their full lifecycle, from first conversation to go-live
- Converting proven partnership models into documented playbooks that Sales or Marketing can scale

What We Are Looking For...

- Strong strategic and analytical thinking able to look at a market, form a view on where the opportunity is, and build a structured business case for it
- Experience building something from scratch in a commercial context: a strategy, a proposition, a partnership model, a new function not just optimising an existing one
- Comfort operating cross-functionally with Product, Finance, Compliance and Legal to deliver something complex, particularly in a regulated or technically intricate space such as credit, lending or payments
- Confidence operating at C-suite and senior stakeholder level, both internally and externally
- Strong commercial modelling skills able to size an opportunity and stress-test a structure
- Excellent written and verbal communication, with the ability to build a proposal that lands with senior stakeholders
- Experience in or alongside a high-growth or scale-up environment, comfortable with pace and ambiguity
- A degree in a quantitative, analytical or commercial discipline (STEM, Finance, Economics, Accounting or Business) from a strong academic institution

Bonus skills

- A background in strategy or management consulting, ideally followed by an in-house move into partnerships, corporate strategy or corp dev
- Prior experience in partnerships, corp dev or 0-to-1 strategy roles at another fintech, platform or high-growth business
- Familiarity with embedded finance, retail partnerships or financial infrastructure licensing models
- A second European language, useful as the function expands across markets

What will help you succeed This isn't a traditional partnerships role centred on managing an existing portfolio or executing against a pre-defined pipeline. Success in this role comes from identifying opportunities, developing the commercial strategy behind them and then building the relationships needed to bring them to life. Relationship management and negotiation are important, but they're built on strategic thinking and commercial judgement rather than replacing them

Benefits. Compensation & Savings:

- Pension scheme.
- Death in Service scheme.
- Income Protection.
- Permanent employees enjoy access to our Share Options Scheme.
- 5% back on in-app purchases.
- £200 for WFH Setup.

Health & Wellbeing:

- Private Medical Insurance including;
- GP consultations (video, telephone or face-to-face).
- Prescribed medication.
- In-patient, day-patient and out-patient care.
- Mental health support.
- Optical, dental & audiological cover.
- Physiotherapy.
- Advanced cancer cover.
- Menopause support.
- Employee Assistance Programme including:
- Unlimited mental health sessions.
- 24/7 remote GP & physiotherapy.
- 24/7 helpline for emotional & practical support.
- Savings & discounts on everyday shopping.
- 1:1 personalised well-being consultations.
- Gym membership discounts.

Family Friendly Policies:

- Enhanced maternity pay.
- Enhanced paternity pay.
- Enhanced adoption pay.
- Enhanced shared parental leave.

Learning & Development:

- Professional Qualifications.
- Professional Memberships.
- Learning Suite for e-courses.
- Internal Training Programmes.
- FCA & Regulatory training.

Workplace Perks:

- Hybrid working: office-based Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday; remote working Tuesday and Friday
- Casual dress code.
- Workplace socials.
- Healthy snacks.

## About Zilch

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: Zilch is a London-based fintech that offers a direct-to-consumer, ad-enabled payments and credit platform, letting users pay now or over time with no interest while earning rewards.
- **Entity Type**: Private (Series C; last extended in 2022 to £122m total)
- **Headquarters**: London, United Kingdom (with an innovation and technology hub in Krakow, Poland)
- **Founded**: 2018
- **Founders**: Philip Belamant (CEO)

## Core Business
- **Primary industry**: Financial technology (Fintech) – payments, consumer credit, and advertising.
- **Target customers**: B2C – consumers across the credit spectrum (subprime to prime). Also B2B – merchants who pay for high-intent customer access through the Zilch app.
- **Mission statement**: “To eliminate the high cost of consumer credit. For good.”

## Products & Services
- **[Zilch Payments Platform]**: A virtual payments card (and soon a physical Visa card) enabling online and in-store purchases.
  - **Pay Now**: Pay upfront and earn up to 5% cashback in Zilch Rewards.
  - **Pay over 6 weeks**: Interest-free installment option.
  - **Pay over 3 months**: For larger purchases; no interest, no late fees.
- **[Zilch Ad Network]**: An ad-enabled platform where merchants pay performance-based commissions for access to Zilch’s high-intent customer base. Revenue is shared with customers to subsidise credit costs.
- **[Snooze]**: A feature allowing customers to delay payments by up to 8 days for flexibility.

## Market Standing
- **Valuation**: Not publicly disclosed (Zilch is a private unicorn, named UK’s fastest-growing tech unicorn by the Financial Times in 2025).
- **Key Metric**: **Total funding** – £122m (Series C extended, closed in 2022 from a £42m extension on the initial £83m Series B round). Also secured a £150m securitised debt facility led by Deutsche Bank in 2025.
- **Recent Financials (FY 2025)**:
  - Revenue: **£110.3m** (93% increase YoY)
  - Gross Merchandise Value (GMV): **£1.9bn** (73% increase YoY)
  - Net losses reduced by 79% year-over-year; achieved first quarter of operating profit in July 2024.
  - 5-year CAGR: 378% on revenue, 285% on GMV.
- **Notable Investors/Partners**:
  - Debt facility from **Goldman Sachs Asset Management** and **Deutsche Bank**.
  - Multi-year strategic partnership with **Visa** (expanding acceptance to over 150 million merchants).
  - All major UK credit referencing agencies.
- **Growth Signals**:
  - Nearly **5 million registered customers**.
  - Monthly GMV exceeded £200m for the first time in 2024.
  - Pay over 3 months product, launched in 2024, now represents 14% of total volume.
  - Spend per active user up 27% compared to FY 2024.
  - Ranked UK’s fastest-growing tech unicorn by the Financial Times, Deloitte, and The Sunday Times in 2025.

## Competitive Advantages
- **Ad-enabled business model**: Zilch subsidises the cost of credit through merchant commissions, creating a two-sided network that rewards both customers and merchants.
- **No interest, no late fees, no penalties**: A genuinely consumer-friendly credit product that aligns the company’s success with customer wellbeing (they do not profit from customer debt).
- **Direct-to-consumer model**: Zilch owns the customer relationship end-to-end (not a white-label product), allowing them to generate first-party data and optimise for conversion rates that far exceed traditional digital ads.
- **Strong unit economics**: Revenue take rate of 6.08% on GMV, and gross profit margin of 49%. Massive growth with improving profitability.

## Strategic Focus
- **Expanding acceptance and usage**: Launching a physical Visa card in the UK in September 2025 to increase wallet share and everyday spend.
- **Growing product breadth**: The new Pay over 3 months product is seeing strong repeat behaviour, and Snooze is being rolled out across all credit purchases.
- **Geographic expansion**: Growing across Europe, with a tech hub in Poland for innovation.
- **Capital efficiency**: Focused on profitability and reducing net losses, leveraging a £150m securitisation facility to scale GMV towards £8bn annually.

## Why Work Here
- **Culture**: Values-driven with a focus on “doing it for our customers,” “doing it the right way,” and “doing it brilliantly.” Emphasis on trust and autonomy.
- **Hybrid working**: Zilch operates a hybrid model, reducing daily commuting.
- **Benefits**: Private medical insurance, enhanced parental leave, free snacks and drinks, 5% back on purchases via Zilch Rewards, training budget, learning platform, and online therapy/mental health support.
- **Growth & development**: Regular reviews, hackathons, a training budget, and an internal learning platform. Zilch invests in employee career progression.
- **Team size**: 289 employees (including contractors) as of March 2025. Flat, impact-focused structure.
- **Inclusive environment**: Zero-tolerance for discrimination; equal opportunities policy for all applicants and employees, including disabled persons.

## Sources
1. [Zilch – Careers Page](https://www.zilch.com/uk/careers/)
2. [Zilch – About Us](https://www.zilch.com/uk/about-us/)
3. [Zilch – Homepage](https://www.zilch.com/uk/)
4. [Zilch – Open Roles on Ashby](https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/zilch)
5. [Zilch Holdings Limited FY 2025 Annual Report](https://www.zilch.com/pdf/financial-statements/zilch-technology-limited-annual-report-and-financial-statements-FY-2025.pdf)

## Other roles at Zilch

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