Kumar Asheshanand profile photo 1 on Tal

Kumar Asheshanand

Senior Product Manager @ Hindustan Times | Building AI Products

Bengaluru

6+ years of work experience

HT Digital Streams
Nov 20241 yr 11 mosPresent

On-site

- Led 0→1 consumer and AI products across HT’s ecosystem, including the Mint Money fintech app and AI tools for the newsroom platform - Built editor-facing systems where writers train the tools on their writing styles to generate first drafts, reducing content creation time by 56%. - Build consumer AI features, including Credit Coach (conversational AI for credit guidance) - Independently built and launched multiple Gen AI products—from financial PDF → news draft, from text article → image and video—taking them from idea to reliable, organisation-wide adoption.
KalaGato
Nov 20221 yr 6 mosApr 2024

Bengaluru, Karnataka, India

- Led product strategy for a portfolio of consumer apps across utility, fintech, and gaming categories, serving 4M+ daily active users. - Built Conversational AI chatbots and engagement features across portfolio apps, delivering 50% engagement growth - Supported app acquisitions end-to-end, providing product due diligence
Rain
Oct 20211 yr 1 moOct 2022

Bengaluru, Karnataka, India

- Defined and launched D2C, B2B and B2B2C product for financial wellness of employees with basic features of KYC, Auto-Pay, Penny drop and profiling. - Scaled the product from scratch to 300K within 6 months. - Planned referrals and rewards growth initiative for user acquisition. - Plan and strategize on neo-banking and card business models.
RailYatri.in
Feb 20201 yr 9 mosOct 2021

Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India

- Led product growth across mobile app and website, driving a 300% increase in train bookings compared to pre-COVID levels. - Responsible for Top of the funnel for Train, Bus, and Food Vertical. ( Improved 2X in 2 months ) - Improved search algorithm based on data to make it more relevant for users. - Improved UI and UX flow of search for Quick Discovery of relevant products. - Leading a team of developers, designers, product Manager and QA daily basis for release planning and execution.
Terribly Tiny Tales
Jul 20198 mosFeb 2020

Mumbai Metropolitan Region

Defining product roadmap and strategy of audio streaming, book reading, and writing for a social app. Introduce the Hindi Language. Bettering recommendation & search algorithms for Social App. Breaking the complex search to simpler with more relevant filters. Making changes in-app to double the core metrics of app.
GitHub
@kumar127

Kumar’s AI Stack

claude code
claude code
codex
codex
cursor
cursor
elevenlabs
elevenlabs
hugging face
hugging face
langchain
langchain

Education

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Building AI Products and Services

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

20241 yr2025
ABV-Indian Institute of Information Technology and Management

B.Tech + MBA, Information Technology

ABV-Indian Institute of Information Technology and Management

20105 yrs2015

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Headline

Senior Product Manager @ Hindustan Times | Building AI Products

About

Product leader with 10+ years of experience building and scaling B2C and B2B products, including AI-first and data-driven platforms. Scaled consumer app products from 0 → 2.5M DAU, led multiple 0→1 launches, and improved critical funnels across fintech, travel, and media. Recently focused on practical AI and GenAI products—shipping tools that reduce user effort, improve decision-making, and deliver real business impact. Hands-on, outcome-driven, and comfortable operating across product strategy, execution, and cross-functional leadership.

Location

Bengaluru

AI stack

claude code

codex

cursor

elevenlabs

hugging face

langchain

Work experience

Senior Product Manager at HT Digital Streams, Nov 2024 - Present · 1 yr 11 mos, On-site, - Led 0→1 consumer and AI products across HT’s ecosystem, including the Mint Money fintech app and AI tools for the newsroom platform - Built editor-facing systems where writers train the tools on their writing styles to generate first drafts, reducing content creation time by 56%. - Build consumer AI features, including Credit Coach (conversational AI for credit guidance) - Independently built and launched multiple Gen AI products—from financial PDF → news draft, from text article → image and video—taking them from idea to reliable, organisation-wide adoption.

Group Product Manager at KalaGato, Nov 2022 - Apr 2024 · 1 yr 6 mos, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India, - Led product strategy for a portfolio of consumer apps across utility, fintech, and gaming categories, serving 4M+ daily active users. - Built Conversational AI chatbots and engagement features across portfolio apps, delivering 50% engagement growth - Supported app acquisitions end-to-end, providing product due diligence

Senior Product Manager at Rain, Oct 2021 - Oct 2022 · 1 yr 1 mo, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India, - Defined and launched D2C, B2B and B2B2C product for financial wellness of employees with basic features of KYC, Auto-Pay, Penny drop and profiling. - Scaled the product from scratch to 300K within 6 months. - Planned referrals and rewards growth initiative for user acquisition. - Plan and strategize on neo-banking and card business models.

Senior Manager of Product Management at RailYatri.in, Feb 2020 - Oct 2021 · 1 yr 9 mos, Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India, - Led product growth across mobile app and website, driving a 300% increase in train bookings compared to pre-COVID levels. - Responsible for Top of the funnel for Train, Bus, and Food Vertical. ( Improved 2X in 2 months ) - Improved search algorithm based on data to make it more relevant for users. - Improved UI and UX flow of search for Quick Discovery of relevant products. - Leading a team of developers, designers, product Manager and QA daily basis for release planning and execution.

Product Consultant at Terribly Tiny Tales, Jul 2019 - Feb 2020 · 8 mos, Mumbai Metropolitan Region, Defining product roadmap and strategy of audio streaming, book reading, and writing for a social app. Introduce the Hindi Language. Bettering recommendation & search algorithms for Social App. Breaking the complex search to simpler with more relevant filters. Making changes in-app to double the core metrics of app.

Education

Building AI Products and Services, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

B.Tech + MBA, Information Technology, ABV-Indian Institute of Information Technology and Management

Public links

github: https://github.com/kumar127