Corporate Development Director at GitLab

Corporate Development Director at GitLab

GitLab is the intelligent orchestration platform for DevSecOps. We empower organizations to boost developer productivity, enhance operational efficiency, and reduce security and compliance risk. With over 50 million registered users and over 50% of the Fortune 100 trusting us, we are committed to building better, more secure software faster.

Our high-performance culture is rooted in our values and a commitment to continuous knowledge exchange. We embrace AI as a core productivity multiplier, expecting all team members to integrate AI into their daily workflows to drive innovation and impact.

As the Corporate Development Director, you will play a pivotal role in shaping GitLab's growth by influencing its investment strategy. This position sits within the Corporate Development & Strategic Partnerships team, reporting to the VP, Corporate Development & Strategic Partnerships, and sits at the intersection of strategy and M&A engagements.

Your responsibilities include leading research to frame GitLab's growth options, mapping markets around our AI-powered DevSecOps platform, and providing clear recommendations to the executive team. When an acquisition is the answer, you will drive the entire deal process from initial outreach through to close and integration. Success is defined not by deal count, but by sharper strategic choices and highly reliable investment theses.

What You Will Do

Strategy and Research

• Own the wider market view: Research the broader market in which GitLab operates, looking beyond specific product categories, including competitive dynamics, AI-native entrants, and shifts in technology value. Collaborate with the team's Analyst to synthesize these findings into clear strategic points of view for GitLab.
• Build an investment thesis: For each focus area, develop an investment thesis. Work closely with Product and Engineering leaders to define critical problems to solve, necessary capabilities, and the associated time and financial costs for internal development.
• Own the competitive and landscape view: Maintain market maps and current intelligence on GitLab's competitors, analyzing their strategy, product direction, pricing, and M&A/funding activities. Produce competitor analyses detailing our strengths, areas of vulnerability, and potential competitor moves.
• Define strategic boundaries: Identify market adjacencies that could dilute focus or areas where economics or competition are unfavorable. Construct a rigorous business case for when GitLab should say 'no'.

Build, Buy, or Partner

• Run the build, buy, partner analysis: For every strategic gap, conduct a side-by-side assessment of building, buying, or partnering, comparing options based on speed, cost, risk, control, and strategic fit, resulting in a clear recommendation.
• Deliver strategic clarity: Produce concise strategy memos and business cases for executives and the Board that articulate the proposed decision, trade-offs, and implications of each path.
• Feed company planning: Integrate an outside-in market view and inorganic growth options into annual and long-range company planning cycles.
• Partner integration: Coordinate closely with the Strategic Partnerships team. When a partnership is the correct path, frame the opportunity and delegate execution to the relevant partnership owner with a clear thesis.

Deal Execution and Integration

• End-to-end deal management: Own the entire M&A process. Validate target fit against GitLab's established target profile and roadmap, developing the acquisition rationale and business case. Drive the process from initial contact to closing and subsequent integration.
• Deal evaluation: Conduct thorough evaluation, developing valuation, commercial integrity assessments, and analyzing impact on GitLab's business, while assisting the VP and executive team with negotiations.
• Cross-functional diligence: Lead pre-LOI validation and diligence across Product, Engineering, Security, Finance, Legal, and People, ensuring all findings are communicated clearly.
• Documentation and execution: Manage deal documents in collaboration with GitLab Legal and external counsel, including preparing NDAs, LOIs, and purchase agreements.
• Integration leadership: Act as the DRI for post-acquisition integration, measuring success against the roadmap and business goals defined in the original business case, and capturing lessons learned for future strategy cycles.
• Network building: Cultivate and maintain relationships with founders, executives, investors, bankers, and advisors to secure early insights and pipeline generation.

What You Will Bring

• Strategy and Deal Experience: Minimum of 8 years across corporate development, corporate strategy, strategy consulting, or technology investing, including 5+ years specifically leading M&A acquisitions end to end within the enterprise software sector.
• Structured Strategic Thinking: The ability to form well reasoned points of view from incomplete data, test them against evidence, and pivot when necessary. You must be comfortable advocating for a 'no' as strongly as an 'yes'.
• Market Research Depth: Proven expertise in market sizing, competitive analysis, and landscape mapping, with a strong ability to translate research into actionable recommendations, not just reports.
• Deal Craft: Proficiency in valuation, financial modeling, deal structuring, negotiation, and integration planning across varied deal structures.
• Technical Fluency: A functional understanding of software development, DevSecOps, and the AI landscape, allowing for substantive technical dialogue with Product and Engineering leadership regarding roadmaps and architecture.
• Executive Communication: Excellent skill in creating short, decision-ready updates and presenting complex trade offs with clarity to executives and the Board in an asynchronous environment.
• Influence Without Authority: Ability to build trust across Product, Engineering, Finance, and Legal departments and drive decisions forward across organizational functions.
• Ownership and Collaboration: Demonstrate complete ownership of the strategic viewpoint and recommendation while partnering closely with the team's Analyst for research support.
• Preferred Qualifications: Familiarity with the DevSecOps, security, AI, and open source ecosystems is a plus.
• Cultural Fit: You highly value the all remote lifestyle and align with our company values.

About the Team

The Corporate Development & Strategic Partnerships team is dedicated to helping GitLab determine how to grow beyond what we can achieve solely through internal development. We own inorganic growth: leading acquisitions, managing strategic partnerships with hyperscalers and AI labs, and conducting the research necessary to decide which opportunities to pursue or bypass. We collaborate across Product, Engineering, Finance, Legal, and the executive group, setting direction and executing the detailed work ourselves in a fully remote, asynchronous framework.

How GitLab Supports Full-Time Employees

• Benefits to support your health, finances, and well-being.
• Flexible Paid Time Off.
• Team Member Resource Groups.
• Equity Compensation and Employee Stock Purchase Plan.
• Growth and Development Fund.
• Parental Leave provisions.

We welcome candidates from diverse experience levels. We encourage applications even if you do not meet every single listed requirement, as we recognize that underrepresented groups may be less likely to apply when facing strict qualification checklists. Please apply, and our recruiters will assess your candidacy.