Innovative Optimist. Passionate about business growth and innovation.
Roles
Co-founder & COO
Aug 2018 - Present
New York, NY
OneThree owns the patents to a complex algorithmic platform and data engine that makes predictions on the most appropriate biological opportunities to reduce the growth of cancer. Simply put: OneThree identifies the ideal therapeutic patient match based on the patient's specific genetics. These predictions are performed computationally, which saves a lot of time and money in wet-lab experiments.
My involvement with OneThree Biotech was one of passion. After losing a family member to cancer in 2013, I was actively involved in fundraising for cancer research and raised money for the cause through sporting events such as the marathon. I was always open to being more deeply involved in the fight against cancer, which ultimately pointed me in this direction.
Whilst networking in NYC, I came across the opportunity to do more when meeting my to-be co-founders, who at the time, were running the largest precision medicine unit at Weill Cornell hospital systems. They were looking for a business co-founder to help commercialize their technology which had produced promising results.
After working as an advisor to help OneThree raise venture capital and determine the ideal customer base, I left my role at Applico and came on full time. My task was to determine the best way to commercialize OneThree’s capabilities through determining product-market fit, go-to-market strategy, and recruiting the team. Through my efforts at OneThree, I was able to adapt the product to the market and close several complex deals (JVs, milestone and royalty partnerships, etc.) worth up to $60M in value with major pharmaceutical companies.
Director, Strategy Consulting
Feb 2019 - Jan 2020
New York, NY
Business Design Lead, Strategy Consulting
Sep 2018 - Feb 2019
New York, NY
Applico is a strategy consultancy that advises large corporations (e.g. Ford) on investments in technology companies with a platform or marketplace business model (e.g. Uber, Airbnb, Grubhub, etc.), and sometimes co-invests. These investments take place in several verticals but typically fall into M&A, capital placements, or funding Applico team members to build sub-divisions from scratch to roll up into the client.
I was recruited into Applico based on my previous financial experience as well as experience with platform business models at Ritual and Huru. I jumped at the opportunity to work alongside accomplished entrepreneurs, such as Tri Tran (ex Munchery CEO & Founder, raised $120M) Abel Lin (ex co-founder of Caviar, sold to GrubHub) ex-investment bankers, and board members of Fortune 500 companies.
My first assignment was a 3-month engagement where I oversaw the reorganization of a 40-person tech sub-division in the home services industry. The sub-division was performing poorly so I restructured the team, revised the product offerings, and created a new go-to-market strategy. The result of my work went so well that I was promoted to Director at Applico and given a new assignment.
In the new assignment, I started by engaging with the executives of a major steel corporation who were interested in taking advantage of the platform business model in their industry. Through my analysis, we concluded that the best option was to build a sub-division from scratch. I thereafter became the interim CEO of SteelNow, a construction metal marketplace that uses AI to accurately predict the price of different metal types. We started off with a 3-month contract that ultimately led to further engagements due to stellar performance. A year later we were able to successfully build out the tech, recruit the team, hit our revenue targets, and roll it up into the parent company. SteelNow is still functioning today, where I had the opportunity to catch up with the existing SteelNow team members in November 2021 on their podcast (see below).
Regional General Manager
Jun 2017 - Aug 2018
New York, NY
Ritual is an online ordering system and food app. A Ritual user orders food through the app from a nearby restaurant and when they do, their co-workers receive a notification that would allow them to order from the same place. The original orderer would then pick up the food for themselves and their colleagues. For picking up the food, they would receive points that can subsequently convert to free food later.
I came across the founders of Ritual after the acquisition of Huru. They had just raised $10M in A-series funding and were looking to accelerate their growth. During my time there, we were able to raise a total of $135M whilst I oversaw the largest market as the Regional General Manager.
I had a great experience working alongside several incredibly smart ex-google entrepreneurs as we troubleshot how to facilitate growth, and continued to add product features. In my region, I was able to create new go-to-market strategies and roll them out globally which resulted in substantial growth in partnerships, revenue, customer retention, and app users. From start to finish I had grown the regional team from 4 to 20 people.
CEO
June 2016 - June 2017
London
COO
June 2016 - June 2017
London
I was introduced to Huru - the name I gave the company after rebranding - through the investors of the original business called DividaBill. DividaBill had gone bankrupt, but the customers were still using the business’ services. The investors were in search of an experienced manager to turn the business around for acquisition.
Huru enables its customers to come to one site and in less than 5 minutes sign up for all their household bills (e.g. internet, energy, water, etc.) and evenly, or unevenly, split those bills between each of their housemates. The original management team had proven some strong traction in market but struggled with the product build and supplier relations which ultimately led to their insolvency.
As a quick fix to rebuilding the product: I initially worked with an outsourced dev team to implement some fixes so that we could serve the existing customers. Further, I added new features that would benefit the suppliers as well. Whilst building the team for the new approach, I completely restructured our supplier offering which ultimately enabled us to sign much more organized, and bigger name suppliers. The strong supplier base helped us operationally as well as built our credibility in the market.
As I continued building the company, I created a business plan and approached the investors. They were impressed and we were able to secure an additional $1.5M into the business, while they moved me into the CEO position. With a stronger foundation on top of our new product, suppliers, and team; we re-established our go-to-market strategy. Due to the addition of new features in our product, it enabled us to tackle the student market, which was previously seen as too risky. The simple fix was to make housemates joint and severally liable for each other’s bills and add a product feature to automatically collect payments after 3 warnings were given. This made the payment rate of students go up from 70% to over 95%. We grew rapidly in this customer base making us an attractive acquisition to our largest competitor, Glide.
Business Development Manager – Marketing & Business Development
April 2014 - June 2016
London
Senior Analyst – Business Planning & Analysis (Strategy)
April 2014 - June 2016
London
TJX is the parent company of over 8 major different retail brands. Since being founded in 1987, its growth in the industry has been impressive landing it consistently on the Fortune 100 list.
When I was leaving finance I wanted to find a position that would help me build a broad array of commercial/operational skills that I could use to become an entrepreneur one day. This led me to accept my first role at TJX.
When I first entered TJX I was given an analyst role on the strategy (i.e. executive decision support team). It was a new team that functioned as an internal consultancy, advising the organization’s major investment spending in a variety of different areas. I was guided by several ex-top strategy consultants. I supported marketing, operations, and expansion with quantitative and qualitative research, forecasting, and analysis of the effectiveness and potential ROI of investment spending. I was awarded during the annual company meet for my work on expansion planning for entering new European countries.
My work with the executives in each area gave me great exposure and subsequently led to a strong promotion to lead the European wide gift cards business, a product line that produced over $48M in revenue annually. This was my first time managing a large cross-functional team and being wholly responsible for an entire product line. The product was sold virtually as an e-gift card, physically in stores, and through partnerships in multiple countries. My efforts with the team here led to beating the targeted growth landing at $52M in sales during my tenure as a leader there.
Proprietary Derivatives Trader
May 2013 - April 2014
London
Marex is a diverse global financial services platform with multiple different divisions. I sat within the proprietary trading division. My role was to trade in public equity markets with the firms capital to make a profit.
I found out about my role at Marex through networking and was excited to participate in my first trading role. The position was extremely selective. I was one of few participants in the training program who was selected to trade in live markets based on my performance.
After losing an uncle to cancer in late 2013, I started to think more seriously about getting involved in work that would result in me having a more lasting impact on the world (beyond my time). I then left Marex to pursue opportunities that would help me build more commercial experience.
Junior Financial Investment Analyst
Nov 2011 - May 2013
London
Legal and General Investment Management is one of the largest investment companies in the UK with over one trillion dollars in assets under management. I was brought into the company as an investment analyst supporting several different funds. I performed analysis on acquisitions of over $100M in value, updated on funds performance, and more.
Speaking
Panel: Business-driven and technologically enabled. Unlock your commercial potential through data-centricity
Poolbeg Partnership Announcement
Investment Panel : Opportunities in Health Care
Winning the Reuter's Entrepreneur Award
Reuter's Entrepreneur Award Finalist Submission
Panel: AI in Drug Discovery
Interview: Platform Business Model
Podcasts
Investments and Advisory
I have been an advisor for Tomo since 2019. I placed an angel investment before their A series. Currently, Tomo is closing their B series funding.
I placed an angel investment in Kumospace during their seed. They have recently closed their Series A funding.
I’m an advisor to the Customer Experience Program.
Writing
How To Plan For A Post-Pandemic Remote Workforce