Benjamin Reece, VP of Product at Vendr
Salt Lake City, UT · Remote · linkedin.com/in/bnjreece · github.com/bnjreece · reece.is · b@reece.is
I lead product on Ruth, Vendr's autonomous AI negotiation agent, trained on $15B+ in transaction data, 200K+ contracts, and 130K+ negotiations. Shipped the roadmap from human-led to copilot and autonomous. Built our internal AI platform (code named "Radar") for product ops, CSM, and support on Next.js, Postgres, Anthropic SDK, MCP tool-use, and multi-model evals.
Former full-stack dev, still writing code.
EXPERIENCE
VENDR | VP OF PRODUCT
JAN 2024 — PRESENT- Lead product for Ruth, Vendr's autonomous AI negotiation agent at agent.vendr.com. Trained on $15B+ in transaction data, 200K+ contracts, and 130K+ negotiations. Shipped roadmap from human-led to copilot and autonomous; launched AI contract analysis, PriceGraph, OpenPrice API, and the customer-facing negotiation agent. 10 major initiatives shipped in Q1 2026; autonomous beta live May 2026.
- Built internal AI platform from scratch (code named "Radar"): multi-model orchestration (Claude Sonnet + Haiku), weighted evaluation pipelines, MCP tool-use server with 14+ retrieval tools, and RAG-adjacent institutional memory. Stack: Next.js, Postgres, Anthropic SDK. Now the institutional brain for product, CSM, and support at Vendr.
- Hands-on. Contributed PRs across customer-facing agent codebase, data pipeline, and internal tooling.
VENDR | SENIOR TECHNICAL PRODUCT MANAGER, PLATFORM
MAR 2023 — DEC 2023- Platform product strategy from zero across 40+ engineers: cut MTTR 1.62hr → 1.1hr and raised DevCSAT 3.21 → 3.73.
RIVIAN | PRODUCT LEAD (CONTRACT)
DEC 2022 — MAR 2023- Led spec and discovery for internal employee-generated content platform, seeding Rivian's highest-performing pre-order campaign with founder RJ Scaringe: 34,000+ pre-orders in 30 days.
VERIZON | HEAD OF PRODUCT, STXTCH
FEB 2021 — DEC 2022- Led 12-person cross-functional team (UX, frontend, DevOps) building the Next.js / React / Node.js-powered Stxtch personal storytelling platform with custom API and admin dashboard. Launched with 10,000+ team-member profiles.
- Championed by Verizon CPO after presenting to C-suite; shepherded net-new SaaS stack through Fortune 500 legal, procurement, and security review; partnered with Verizon IT for global deployment.
- Flagship L&D program "Women of the World": 9.3 NPS across 1,700-user pilot.
DEAR WORLD | CHIEF PRODUCT OFFICER
NOV 2018 — FEB 2021- Promoted to CEO in final year. Led SaaS pivot from event-based model to scalable L&D product, growing ARR from $600K to $2.8M.
- Drove Global Fortune 100 L&D transformation as embedded product executive: launched virtual onboarding for 100,000+ employees annually. 86% reported deep connection to company values.
MD ANDERSON CANCER CENTER | HEAD OF PRODUCT & ENGINEERING, ASPIRE
JAN 2016 — NOV 2018- Led planning, design, engineering, and content for a $1.7M interactive mobile-first L&D platform. Launched to 200,000+ students with 54% increase in favorable post-test results from V1. Today: 150,000+ students across 800+ schools in 47 states.
- Managed HIPAA/COPPA/WCAG/GDPR compliance across 12+ hours of gamified experience; hired 80+ staff across engineering, design, and content; built custom PHP/Laravel CMS with MySQL backend and dashboard reporting.
DELTREE | FOUNDER & OPERATING PARTNER
2009 — 2018- Founded Deltree, a product and engineering shop embedded with Fortune 500 clients. Shipped custom-stack platforms reaching 1B+ users and managed $10M+ in product development pipelines across engagements with Samsung, Microsoft, Salesforce, Rockefeller Foundation, BMW/Guggenheim. Full portfolio at deltree.com.
- Co-founded 2x VC-backed SaaS video platform startups (Kinio, Liveset; 20M+ users) on Rails and PHP with AWS. TechStars LaunchPad Ignition; TechCrunch Disrupt SF. Both failed, both formative.
EDUCATION
UNIVERSITY OF NEW ORLEANS · COMPUTER SCIENCE