Akshit Kumar
Verified Expert in Product Management
Product Manager
Akshit is a product and strategy leader with 8+ years of experience launching mobile apps and web products and scaling them to 10+ million active users. He has led teams across product, design, technology, and growth using Agile software product development in eCommerce, travel, marketplaces, fintech, and eMobility. Akshit combines data analysis and user feedback loops when building product roadmaps. He is also an entrepreneur who has achieved a successful exit via acquisition.
Project Highlights
Expertise
Work Experience
Product Owner
Yara
- Owned two key mobile apps: FarmCare and FarmGo. Led the launch of crops in new regions and maintenance of existing ones across India, Southeast Asia, and Africa.
- Handled daily decisions for quick and scalable implementation. Created user stories, defined acceptance criteria, prioritized product backlog based on program increment planning, and tracked project status to ensure delivery of high-value features.
- Worked with Scrum leads to foster a culture of collaboration, manage team dynamics, and set clear team goals for successful solutions development and an exciting work environment and experience.
Product Manager
Invisibly
- Released mobile apps where users can access premium news content, like NYT and WSJ, by paying only for the content they consume, rather than paying full subscription fees. The news content was aggregated through APIs and personalized for the users.
- Worked with senior executives to build a product roadmap for the Invisibly Android and iOS mobile app in sync with the company vision and goals. Successfully launched a new, reiterated version of the mobile app in a quarter.
- Collaborated with the design and engineering team to release a revamped product across 12 sprints. Created Jira tickets and maintained Jira boards to ensure effective workflow between multiple stakeholders.
Product Manager
Ather Energy
- Worked with the senior leadership to build quarterly roadmaps in sync with the company vision. Converted these roadmaps into projects to be executed by the engineering team.
- Ensured efficient workflow across multiple stakeholders to launch growth features like personalized ride statistics across four sprints. Increased the number of users by 40% MoM, analyzed user behavior data, and built data dashboards for features.
- Collaborated with the research team to conduct market study and competitive research. Set up and conducted user interviews to understand user sentiment for the product.
Product Manager
Zeta Account
- Launched a new prepaid card product for a new target customer segment for India's largest private-sector bank.
- Collaborated with the client's product team and our design team to build Android and iOS mobile app prototypes.
- Worked with the engineering team to build modules, such as KYC and compliance, and integrate the APIs with the mobile app.
- Partnered with the back-end developers to build a scalable architecture that could concurrently support one million transactions per second for the 50+ million userbase.
Product Lead
Meru Cabs
- Collaborated with the sales team to gather requirements from corporate clients for the B2B2C employee commute solution, which was new to the market.
- Distilled multiple client requirements into an MVP PRD and built a one-year product roadmap.
- Led the product, data, and design team to build an MVP for two mobile apps (Android and iOS) for the rider and one web portal for the client admin. We completed this in one quarter via six sprints, and the MVP CSAT was 92.
- Collaborated with the C-suite leadership team to build pitch decks and revenue models for a successful acquisition by India's second-largest conglomerate, Mahindra & Mahindra.
Product Manager
Ithaka
- Worked with the leadership team to build a revenue model for the business.
- Collaborated with the engineering team to revamp user acquisition funnels in the mobile apps and reduced active user churn rates by 64%.
- Worked with the product and engineering teams to implement two revenue-generating features in the mobile apps, which increased MRR by 2x in one quarter.
- Collaborated with the marketing teams to launch user growth campaigns that increased the number of bookings by 12% week-over-week.
Co-founder and CEO
RentEzee
- Built RentEzee, a P2P marketplace to rent and rent out products. Raised an angel round, was selected to participate in the Y Combinator startup school, and had a successful exit via acquisition.
- Developed the product (Android and iOS apps) from zero to 17,000 products available for rent across eight product categories, such as travel gear, cameras and drones, and sports equipment.
- Partnered with my co-founder (COO) to devise a strategy to successfully execute 40+ orders and physical product deliveries per day, resulting in $100,000+ in MRR.
Product Manager
Fitpass
- Collaborated with the CEO to understand the user and competitive market and create a long-term product roadmap.
- Worked with the engineering teams to launch two mobile apps (Android and iOS) across fitness and nutrition services.
- Scaled the business in two years from 10 to 2,500+ partnerships with fitness studios and the mobile user app by 12x to 150,000 weekly active users. The company became the fittech market leader.
- Partnered with the sales team to gather user feedback and maintain the CSAT at 80+.
- Collaborated with the marketing team on communications to keep the product and social media campaigns in sync.
- Worked with the leadership team to build an investment strategy and presentation decks to raise a $1 million seed round.
Project History
Prepaid Card Product for India's Largest Private Sector Bank
Led the product development to launch a new prepaid card product for a bank that traditionally dealt with CASA banking products. The new product included mobile apps and virtual payment cards.
I led the product team and worked with engineering and design leads to release the card and mobile apps as per the client's requirements. One of our challenges was to build an engineering architecture that could support the scale of transactions that the client expected.
We built an architecture that could support one million secure transactions per second, which was 100x more than the client wanted and 10x the peak expected. This was to protect the product from unexpected surges at any time in the next year's roadmap.
Key product modules:
• Online e-KYC
• Virtual prepaid card
• Online, offline, and NFC secure transactions
• Mobile passbook
• RBI compliance for all transactions (RBI is India's central bank and regulatory body)
Office Commute for Meru App
Led the product development and launch of the Office Commute feature of the Meru app. This included releasing a major feature on the user apps (Android and iOS) and a web portal for the corporate client admin.
My team scoped out the requirements from our top corporate clients and planned an MVP release with the most necessary features:
1. Android and iOS apps for the riders to reserve cabs for their office commute (home to work and back) in one go for up to 30 days in advance.
2. A web-based portal for the client's admin to track and manage those rides along with all the invoicing and bill payment facilities.
We released the MVP in one quarter via six sprints. I led the GTM strategy for the product launch in collaboration with the marketing team. The launch included a combination of discount offers and collaboration events at business parks to gain a critical mass of users.
Revamped Ride Statistics for an Electric Two-wheeler Startup
Owned the feature where users can see their ride statistics on their mobile app after completing a ride on an electric scooter. We increased the app engagement by 26% and the quarterly user retention by 10%
Data analysis showed that Ride Statistics was the most engaging feature on the mobile app. My team decided to capitalize on that and make it even more engaging for the users.
We segmented users into cohorts and decided which segment to target, conducted extensive user interviews to prioritize problems, used the Octalysis Framework (gamification) to implement new features in the app, and created viral loops.
In one quarter after the release, user engagement increased by 26%, and user retention increased by 10%.
Education
Master's Degree in Quantum Physics
University of Sussex - Sussex, England, UK
Bachelor's Degree in Chemical Engineering
Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee - Roorkee, Uttarakhand, India
Skills
Tools
Slack, Zoom, Jira, Figma, Confluence, Asana, Google Analytics, MATLAB
Platforms
WooCommerce, Google Analytics 4, Blockchain, Mixpanel
Paradigms
Agile Workflow, Agile Product Management, Gamification, Requirements Analysis, B2C, Design Thinking, Digital Marketing Best Practices, Agile Software Development, Mobile App Design, Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO), Marketplace Platforms, Agile, Scrum, Kanban, Change Management, B2B2C, Agile Project Management, Business to Business to Consumer (B2B2C)
Industry Expertise
Marketplaces, Digital Banking, Health & Wellness
Other
Gmail, Notion, Research, Project Management, Data Analysis, Experimental Research, Product Management, Wireframe to Product, Product Growth, Growth Strategy, Business Strategy, Competitor Analysis & Profiling, Social Media Content, Company Strategy, Product Leadership, Leadership, App UI, Pitch Decks, Pitch Presentations, User Interviews, User Interface (UI), Hiring, App Growth, Stakeholder Management, Product Requirements Documentation (PRD), Wireframing, BRD, Business Requirements, Client Services, Client Management, Presentation Design, Product Launch, Product Marketing, MVP Design, Minimum Viable Product (MVP), Customer Segmentation, User Personas, Go-to-market Strategy, Product Development, Agile Sprints, Agile Product Delivery, Mobile Applications, Mobile App Development, Prototyping, User Flows, Growth, User Engagement, Engagement Strategy, Product Roadmaps, API Integration, Startups, Conceptualization, Digital Product Management, Roadmaps, UX Roadmaps, Strategy, Analytics, eCommerce, Design Requirements, Functional Requirements, User Experience (UX), User Workflows, UX Design, Feature Prioritization, Backlog Grooming, Mockups, User Stories, A/B Testing, Product Design, Feature Backlog Prioritization, Consumer Applications, Feature Roadmaps, Backlog Management, Web & Mobile Applications, Product Strategy, Requirements & Specifications, Web Product Management, App Product Management, Mobile, Mobile Apps, Web Applications, Website Optimization, Subscriptions, Customer Interviews, Customer Journeys, Project Planning, Requirements, Ideation, Mobile UI, Mobile UX, Product Planning, UI Design, Product Vision, Feature Planning, Lean Product Manager, New Product Development, Direct to Consumer (D2C), Planning, Team Management, Platforms, Technical Product Management, Dashboards, App UX, Customer Acquisition, Documentation, Distributed Team Management, Web App UX, Journey Mapping, Product Positioning, Minimum Marketable Product (MMP), Value Proposition, Checkout, Payment Gateways, User Feedback, Annotated Wireframes, Customer Research, UX Wireframes, Lean Product Management, Business to Business (B2B), Two-sided Communities, Multi-sided Marketplaces, Loyalty Programs, Creative Thinking, Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), Strategic Planning, Strategic Planning & Execution, Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC), Data Analytics, Product Delivery, Agile Coaching, Business to Consumer (B2C), Product Consultant, Startup Consulting, Apps, Market Research, QA Leadership, Reporting, Culture Management, Community, Competition Research, Scope, Discovery, Benchmarking, Fitness, Web UX, Web UI, User Onboarding, Digital Product Design, Integration, Booking Apps, Front-end Development, Business Development, Scope of Work, Market Research Analyst, Websites, Software Development, Competitive Analysis, Development Strategy, Launch Strategy, Strategy Planning, Market Research & Analysis, New Product Rollout, Growth Model, Software Architecture, User Behavior, Data Management, Business Intelligence (BI) Platforms, Third-party Management, Partnerships, Workflow Tools, WordPress, Lead Generation, Web Design, Recommendation Systems, Android, iOS, Seed Fundraising, Customer Support, Revenue Strategy, Revenue Optimization, User Acceptance Testing (UAT), QA Testing, Enterprise SaaS, Android App Design, iOS App Design, JSON API, Process Documentation, SaaS Product Management, Client Presentations, Fintech, Growth Hacking, Growth Marketing, Content Management, Customer Service, B2B, Digital Marketing, Digital Marketing Strategy, User Research, Content Strategy, Writing & Editing, Content Creation, Product Ownership, Product Discovery, Consulting, Product Owner, Quality Assurance (QA), Search Engine Marketing (SEM), Search Engine Optimization (SEO), SaaS, Growth Marketing Product Manager, Technical Hiring, Software as a Service (SaaS), Release Management, Digital Experience Design, Agile Leadership, Sprint Planning, Travel Product Manager, Market Strategy and Research Product Manager, Monetization, Product Conceptualization, Marketing, Conversion Rate, User Journey Maps, User Journeys, UX Research, Validated User Research, B2C Marketing, Business Models, Cross-functional Team Leadership, SEO Tools, SEO Marketing, Go-to-market Plans, Community Growth, Jobs to be Done (JTBD), Quantitative User Research, Business Analysis, Social Media Apps, Subscription Processing, Two-sided Marketplaces, Cloud Services, Internet of Things (IoT), Project Scheduling, Organic SEO, BaaS, Vendor Management, Data Reporting, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Digital Transformation, Chief Product Officer (CPO), Project Consultancy, ROI, B2B Product Management, IaaS, Branding, Social Media, Mapping, Web3, Tokenomics, Cryptocurrency, Fintech Consultant, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning, Generative Pre-trained Transformers (GPT), Programming, Fundraising, ERD, APIs, Payment APIs, Card Payments, Online Payments, Mobile Payments, Mobile Banking, Online Banking, Prepaid Cards, Credit Card Processing, Technical Drawing, API Documentation, Lucidchart, P2P, Angel Investing, User Requirements, Architecture, Viral Marketing, Finance Product Manager, Budgeting, Production, Product Analytics, Big Data, Algorithms, Technical Writing, User-generated Content, Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO)
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