Headline

Partnerships & Growth Leader | Revenue, Distribution, Monetisation, GTM

About

🚀 Business leader with 10 years of experience building and scaling growth engines across fintech and consumer tech with one consistent outcome: Partnerships that generate revenue at scale. I have built, launched, and monetised strategic alliance programs across India's most recognised consumer platforms — Zomato, Times Internet, Tata Neu, and Fi Money — operating at the intersection of business development, product-led distribution, and P&L ownership. My track record spans the full partnership lifecycle: identifying white-space revenue opportunities, structuring complex multi-stakeholder deals, shipping partnership-integrated products from zero to one, and scaling them into durable revenue engines. What I bring: 📈 Revenue-Generating Alliances: Architected partnership frameworks across fintech, foodtech, and subscription-based products that unlocked new distribution channels, drove enterprise sales, generated incremental platform spend, and created rewards and monetisation engines. 🎯 Drive growth with strong fundamentals: Acquisition, GMV/spends, CAC, not just top-line growth, but sustainable economics 🧠 Operate like an owner: P&L ownership and comfortable navigating ambiguity to drive decisions Impact snapshot: 💳 Scaled lending businesses to ₹XXCr+ monthly run-rate via forging lending partnerships with Banks & NBFCs at Fi Money. 📊 Built acquisition engines contributing up to ~50% of total volumes at Fi Money (lending and credit cards) 💰 P&L Ownership at Scale: Owned the end-to-end rewards and monetisation P&L for Fi's loyalty program — driving revenue growth of ₹XX Cr+ ARR through brand partnerships 🌐 Drove ~40% of subscription growth through ecosystem-led distribution and Enterprise partnerships (Zomato and Times Prime) 💳 Payment alliances to drive spends on Zomato Skills: - Distribution/Acquisition/Channel partnerships - Enterprise Partnerships - Loyalty and Rewards - Brand and merchant alliances → I am available at kharbandasumant@gmail.com

Location

Bengaluru

AI stack

claude

gemini

openai

perplexity

claudecode

Wispr Flow

Work experience

Director - Partnerships and Growth at Fi, Apr 2023 - Present · 3 yrs 4 mos, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India, ### Owned strategic partnerships across Debit & Credit Cards, Rewards, Personal Loans, UPI, driving revenue, distribution & adoption, and platform growth through demand-side growth (distribution/partner channels, merchant alliances, and brand monetisation) and supply-side partnerships (banks, fintechs, NBFCs, TSPs) <<Demand Partnerships>> 1. Rewards and Loyalty: Led the Rewards P&L, driving XX Cr revenue and YY% uplift in redemption velocity. • Rebuilt the Rewards charter by launching “Pay with Points” with Razorpay and expanding into high-engagement categories like gift cards, travel miles (Singapore airlines, AirIndia, Club ITC), and merchandise. • Delivered on revenue targets with positive unit economics while scaling user adoption & engagement 2. Brand Partnerships: • Built the merchant alliances strategy across dining, travel, lifestyle categories to drive debit & credit card usage & spends with co-funded commercial constructs • Built the partnerships & integrations ecosystem powering value prop of cobranded credit cards across travel & lifestyle benefits through scalable & cost-efficient commercial constructs supporting the credit card portfilio 3. User Acq/Distribution Partnerships: • Built partnerships across travel tech & commerce ecosystems, unlocking ~25% of DC and 30% of CC sourcing through contextual, high-intent acq journeys • Scaled the lending channels into a core acq engine, contributing ~50% of total disbursals through structured sourcing, CAC governance & lead quality controls 4. Ecosytsem Partnerships: Drove user reactivation campaigns through checkout integrations with Razorpay & GoKwik, recovering ~X% of dormant cards and UPI users within target CAC <<Supply Partnerships>> • Expanded the lender ecosystem by identifying & onboarding X no of NBFC partners, helping strengthen credit supply & reduce concentration risk for a ₹XX Cr+ lending portfolio • Led issuer/bank partnerships for credit card aligning commercials, CVP, & GTM execution

Associate Director - Partnerships and Digital Acquisitions at Tata Digital, Dec 2021 - Feb 2023 · 1 yr 3 mos, Delhi, India, ### Launched and scaled the Tata Neu co-branded credit card in partnership with HDFC Bank, Visa, and RuPay through strategic brand and ecosystem partnerships 1. CVP & Merchant Partnerships: Led brand partnerships across Tata ecosystem, co-creating the CVP through brand-integrated rewards and contextual acquisition journeys to scale high-intent card issuance. 2. Strategic Bank Partnerships: Program-managed the HDFC Bank partnership across product, tech, and marketing workstreams, driving 2L+ issuance with 90% activation rate and improving funnel efficiency. 3. Channel & Distribution Partnerships: Designed and scaled a structured credit card issuance program across Tata ecosystem, contributing ~30% of sourced volumes through high-intent phygital channels. 4. Issuer & Network Partnerships: Led pitch development/issuer expansion, and commercial structuring with SBI Cards and Kotak Bank to unlock growth via new bank partners. Managed relationships with Rupay and VISA aligning network incentives etc. ** Recognized with Tata Digital’s “Fireball” award for driving the Tata NeuCard value proposition and accelerating program rollout across the Tata ecosystem

Head of B2B Business at Times Prime, Apr 2020 - Nov 2021 · 1 yr 8 mos, Gurugram, Haryana, India, ### On the launch team for Times Prime Gold, scaling the flagship lifestyle subscription through enterprise partnerships. 1. B2B Business: Transformed Times Prime into a scalable distribution-led business by building enterprise partnerships across B2B, B2B2C, and B2C channels, leading to ₹XX Cr ARR through bulk and platform-led deals. 2. Brand alliances: Expanded Times Prime’s value proposition by partnering with leading brands including Google, Amazon, Uber, Cult to offer exclusive, member-only benefits, strengthening subscription appeal and driving acquisition and engagement. **Awarded ASPIRE status, highest recognition, for exemplary performance - consecutive revenue growth and target achievement over 2 quarters*

Partnerships Lead - Zomato Gold at Zomato, Apr 2018 - Mar 2019 · 1 yr, On-site, ### On the launch team for Zomato Gold, scaling the flagship dining membership across India and the UAE through on-platform and off-platform strategic partnerships and alliances. • Owned the subscriber growth and revenue charter, driving ~30% of total monthly users and over Rs.XX Cr in annual revenue through strategic partnerships and consumer promotions. • Built and scaled revenue partnerships from scratch across key verticals: product and distribution (Telcos, OEMs, E-commerce), payment ecosystem (banks and wallets), loyalty, affiliate, and brand sponsorships. • Developed category-specific playbooks across Consumer Tech, Telcos, Cab-hailing, OTTs, OTAs, Airlines, E-commerce, BFSI, D2C, and Entertainment. • Led 20+ brand partnerships including Amex, Flipkart, Myntra, MakeMyTrip, PhonePe, Amazon, WeWork, Coca-Cola, Cure.fit, OnePlus, Netflix, and all leading banks.

Growth and Partnerships at Zomato, Apr 2017 - Mar 2018 · 1 yr, Gurgaon, India, ### Part of the Zomato growth team, contributing to the scale-up of the online ordering business from ~4Mn to ~20Mn monthly orders 1) Growth - Online Ordering - Owned growth for Zomato’s online ordering subscription product (Zomato Treats) driving acquisition, and engagement. - Led end-to-end growth marketing across owned channels (CRM: email, SMS, push) to drive user acquisition and subscriptions. - Designed and executed growth experiments (free trials, A/B testing) to improve order frequency. - Built cohort-based and personalized campaigns to increase stickiness and drive higher order frequency among subscribers. 2) Strategic Partnerships - Built payment alliances from scracth with leading banks and wallets, driving incremental transactions and new user acquisition through offer-led constructs. - Closed and scaled marquee partnerships across affiliates, e-comm and OEMs to drive new users within defined cost guardrails.

Assistant Marketing Manager at Oxigen, Mar 2015 - Nov 2016 · 1 yr 9 mos, Gurgaon, India, • Led end-to-end planning and execution of targeted, integrated marketing campaigns across owned channels, including concept development, promotional strategy, and execution governance. • Drove monthly and quarterly marketing planning by building campaign calendars aligned to engagement goals, and collaborating cross-functionally to ensure effective rollout. • Designed and executed merchant offers to increase transacting users, leveraging targeted promotions and offers. • Driving event-based opportunities to engage customers, build Brand Associations & drive revenue by leveraging properties like IPL (Oxigen Gujarat Lions), Cricket South Africa (#PlayTheHost), Campaign with Brand Endorser, Sachin Tendulkar(#BinBatauaFriday). • Managed on-ground activations, events and sponsorships