“The time to build your practice and technology around OpenAI is now,” said new OpenAI Vice President Colleen Kapase in a LinkedIn post. “We are here building an epic GTM (Go To Market) Sales, Marketing, Operations and Partner machine tailor made and laser focused on AI.”
Colleen Kapase, who has overseen aggressive channel charges at Google Cloud and Snowflake, has taken a top channel post at OpenAI to lead the large language model powerhouse’s enterprise channel charge.
“The time to build your practice and technology around OpenAI is now,” said Kapase in a LinkedIn post after being named vice president of Strategic Global Partners and Ecosystems at OpenAI, the maker of the popular ChatGPT platform. “We are here building an epic GTM (Go To Market) Sales, Marketing, Operations and Partner machine tailor made and laser focused on AI.”
Kapase said bringing “value to enterprise customers” through a “vibrant, profitable and strategic ecosystem” is her super power. “But this time I’m thinking differently than ever before,” she wrote. “This time we will harness the power of AI to support, inform, train and engage with partners. Together we will sharpen new skills and build value for customers that will produce wonder and true ROI.”
Kapase’s appointment comes just one month after Google Cloud partners expressed “shock” and sadness that the three year Google Cloud veteran had suddenly stepped aside as Google Cloud Vice President of Channels and Partner Programs.
Kapase said she could not be more excited about joining OpenAI Chief Revenue Officer Denise Holland Dresser who announced Kapase’s appointment as part of an all out partner offensive for OpenAI Codex AI coding platform.
Holland Dresser in a LinkedIn post said Codex has hit four million weekly active users, up from three million active user sjust two weeks ago.
“We’re seeing Codex become a core part of how teams operate,” wrote Holland Dresser. “To help companies adopt Codex even faster, we’re launching Codex Labs – a program that brings OpenAI experts directly to you to help teams quickly adopt Codex.
But we can’t do it alone. That’s why we’re partnering with firms like Accenture, Capgemini, CGI, Cognizant, Infosys, PwC and Tata Consultancy Services to help scale Codex globally.”
Kapase said ChatGPT took the “world by storm” and opened possibilities to “inspire humanity” to do things differently..
“OpenAI’s footprint quickly expanded to enterprise customers who are already realizing significant outcomes,” she said. “But this ball game is in the early innings and OpenAI, together with our partners, future impact on joint customers will be monumental. Some would say the most impactful technological leap ever.”
Kapase’s appointment comes with a number of LLM and AI companies mounting aggressive channel initiatives.
Just last month, CRN reported that in an exclusive story that LLM powerhouse Anthropic was investing $100 million to build out its Claude Partner Network.
Jhon Alexander, a global marketing leader for Quantiphi, one of the top AI solution providers in the country, said Kapase’s appointment is a channel game changer for OpenAI. He said Kapase has proven her channel mettle at AI focused companies like Google Cloud and Snowflake.
“We worked with Colleen at both Google Cloud and Snowflake,” he said. “She is a strong channel advocate who does a phenomenal job driving partner first and partner centric initiatives.”
Alexander said he sees Kapase’s OpenAI appointment opening up the AI opportunity to many more partners and enterprise customers.
“This is an amazing opportunity,” he said. “OpenAI has been the leader in the LLM market. The timing could not be better. This is a big opportunity for Quantiphi to bring the power of AI to more enterprise customers.”
