Varadharajan Ragunathan
Chennai
Summary
Senior product leader with adtech experience in travel and retail. Built and scaled products driving more than $200M in cumulative ad revenue across airlines, hospitality, and retail. Led large distributed teams and managed global P&L ownership.
Overview
13
13
years of professional experience
1
1
Certification
Work History
Head - Martech/Adtech & Customer engagement
Tata Consultancy Services
Chennai
09.2024 - Current
- Advised two leading airlines and one tourism board on multi-stage monetisation product vision, integrating Adobe suite and SFDC to enhance revenue potential.
- Delivered AI-powered adtech solution leveraging 1P signals and 3P contextual targeting data to optimise advertising effectiveness..
- Conceptualised and scaled GTM targeting 120 top CMOs across retail, CPG, airlines, and BFSI.
- Built and managed 11 senior consultants and product managers across loyalty, CRM, advertising, and UI/UX.
- Built and scaled 150-member team delivering 20 mm ARR and 32 mm TCV within 2 years.
- Developed patented prototype for haptic checkout engagement, resulting in a 4-5% increase in average basket size..
Head - Monetization & Customer engagement
Bigbasket
Bengaluru
08.2021 - 09.2024
- Established and scaled 6-member team, achieving $35 million in incremental ad revenues.
- Led product managers on new placements and UI/UX formats improving CTRs 30%.
- Developed and presented 3-year board roadmap targeting 5% increase in b2c monetisation.
Head - GTM & Sales Strategy
Amazon Ads
Bengaluru
07.2017 - 07.2021
- Developed GTM list targeting non-endemic categories to monetise post-checkout audiences.
- Generated additional annual revenue of £50 million by automating sales workflows.
- Implemented Salesforce to streamline sales processes and improve productivity.
- Integrated third-party data and SFMC to build stochastic and lookalike audiences.
- Improved system reliability across multiple platforms, contributing to 3% revenue growth.
- Partnered with technical architect to fix root causes for ad density and latency.
Brand Capital – General Manager
Times of India
05.2014 - 06.2017
- Expanded South portfolio to over $15 MM in Brand Capital (part of Times of India) through $2-3 MM investment in media currency for early movers in emerging segments like online SMB compliance, Edutech, and online adventure holidays.
- Developed enduring relationships and managed upward stakeholder engagement to support successful branding initiatives.
Education
PGDM (MBA) -
IIM Ahmedabad
01-2002
B. Tech - Civil Engineering
IIT Madras
01-1999
Skills
- Monetization strategy
- GTM strategy
- Customer engagement
- Martech integration
- Sales automation
- Product roadmap
- UI/UX design
- Cross functional leadership
- Stakeholder management
- Executive communication
- Leadership
- Team building
Certification
Recognized AdTech expert, jury member (iMedia) and speaker in several digital ad events (refer LinkedIn profile).
Accomplishments
- Member of MMA board and part of jury for annual MMA awards and iMedia speaker;
- Speaker at several UX/digital ads events
- Contributed several articles in Economic times;
- Conducted several webinars on marketing/CX innovations and rated amongst TCS's top talent;
- Ideated & organized monthly speaker series @ Amazon India (VISTAAR) which had India's best-known minds across fields (Olympians, philanthropists, policy makers) to share their wisdom over a 1-hour F2F interaction with Amazon employees.
Websites, Portfolios, Profiles
https://www.linkedin.com/in/varadha/
HOBBIES AND INTEREST
Behavioural psychologist - worked with Ministry of Environment for driving adoption of public transport across India and recognized by Niti Ayog for the contribution; Intermediate badminton player - have played the sport in all continents and keen follower and amateur coach ; Deeply interested in promoting mental wellness and peace;, Organizational psychologist - have organized several learning and team building workshops acros my roles; Fascinated by how people and teams work.
Timeline
Head - Martech/Adtech & Customer engagement
Tata Consultancy Services
09.2024 - Current
Head - Monetization & Customer engagement
Bigbasket
08.2021 - 09.2024
Head - GTM & Sales Strategy
Amazon Ads
07.2017 - 07.2021
Brand Capital – General Manager
Times of India
05.2014 - 06.2017
PGDM (MBA) -
IIM Ahmedabad
B. Tech - Civil Engineering
IIT Madras