Chief Executive Officer — Urban-Mobility Marketplace

The mandate

This marketplace has proved that urban trips can be aggregated at national scale; it has not yet proved that growth, partner livelihoods and dependable cash generation can coexist. A period of fuel inflation, aggressive incentives and uneven city expansion has left the board with an uncomfortable picture: gross bookings continue to rise, yet contribution after driver support, safety costs and local operations varies widely by city and hour. The next Chief Executive Officer must turn a collection of locally successful businesses into one economically coherent mobility system.

The platform serves commuters and corporate travel programmes through car, auto-rickshaw and two-wheeler categories. It also supplies dispatch, payments and safety tools to independent driver-partners. Approximately ₹3,750 crore of annual gross bookings sits within the remit, alongside a 450-person employed organisation and a much larger partner ecosystem. Bengaluru contains the product, marketplace science and central operations teams; city general managers hold meaningful commercial responsibility. The tension between central optimisation and local market judgement is real and will not be solved by moving every decision to headquarters.

The incoming executive inherits a credible brand, strong frequency in core catchments and data capable of improving pricing and supply. They also inherit disputed promotional spend, cities below the board's return threshold and fragmented driver communication. The board will fund durable density, but not subsidised headline share.

This operating chief executive appointment joins marketplace liquidity, take-rate architecture, customer trust, driver economics, safety and regulation. The appointee may reshape the city portfolio and executive team and recommend investment or closure; major capital and material partner-term changes require board approval.

Why this seat is open

The incumbent has agreed a planned departure after completing the present strategy cycle. They will remain available for an orderly handover, including introductions to regulators, city leaders and the driver advisory council. The board has deliberately begun the search before announcing the transition because a rushed succession would destabilise both the workforce and partner community. It wants an external perspective for the next stage rather than a caretaker of the existing playbook.

What you will own

• Decide where the marketplace can win economically. Segment every operating city by density, customer value, regulatory posture and path to contribution; invest, repair, partner or exit accordingly.
• Rebuild unit economics at trip and cohort level, separating genuine network investment from incentives that reward behaviour without improving retention or availability.
• Establish a partner proposition that makes earnings, deductions, dispute resolution and safety support intelligible. Create a regular mechanism through which driver evidence reaches executive decisions without becoming performative consultation.
• Set pricing and service-category guardrails that balance affordability, fulfilment and partner income. Exceptions must have named owners, expiry dates and measurable hypotheses.
• Strengthen rider trust by reducing cancellations, improving incident response and making service recovery consistent across cities and modes.
• Lead and develop the 450-person organisation. Clarify the respective authority of product, marketplace, finance and city leaders; replace ambiguous matrices with decisions that can be traced to one accountable executive.
• Represent the business with transport authorities, consumer bodies, institutional clients and capital providers. Regulatory engagement must begin before product launches, not after complaints or enforcement.
• Allocate technology and operating capital against an agreed three-year thesis, with explicit downside triggers and no protected legacy programme.

The first 12 months

During the first 60 days, listen before changing partner economics. Visit at least six contrasting cities, ride with active and recently churned drivers, examine cancellation and incident cases, and reconcile finance's contribution view with the marketplace team's model. By day 90, present a city-and-category map that identifies where cash is earned, where strategic investment is justified and where continued participation destroys value. The board should receive no more than five decisions, each supported by cohort evidence and a named implementation leader.

By month six, the chosen city actions should be under way. Pricing experiments will have control groups; incentive budgets will be governed by incremental trips and retained supply rather than downloads; the bottom cohort of structurally uneconomic micro-markets will have repair or exit plans. A redesigned driver statement and dispute workflow should be live in the largest markets, with response times independently sampled.

By the first anniversary, the business should show at least two consecutive quarters of positive contribution after central marketplace costs in the retained core, a 15% reduction in incentive spend per completed trip and an eight-point improvement in peak-hour fulfilment. Driver-support cases older than seven days should fall by 60%, while serious safety incidents are reviewed within 24 hours. The executive team should operate against one weekly trading view and one monthly capital view.

What the board will measure

• Growth quality: retained-customer frequency and completed trips improve without deterioration in post-incentive contribution.
• Partner health: median net earnings per engaged hour rise in the priority cities, avoidable churn falls and payment disputes are resolved within published service levels.
• Portfolio discipline: every city has an evidenced strategic status, with capital and leadership attention matching that status.
• Reliability and safety: cancellation, fulfilment and severe-incident response improve together rather than one metric being managed at the expense of another.
• Cash: the core marketplace reaches the agreed contribution and working-capital milestones, with forecast variance explained before funds are committed.
• Leadership: city general managers understand their decision rights, critical roles have successors and employee attrition in marketplace science and operations remains within the agreed range.

The person

You have led a scaled, high-frequency marketplace or network business in which supply is not owned and small changes in price, utilisation or service quality alter both sides of the ecosystem. Your experience may come from mobility, logistics, travel technology, last-mile commerce or another regulated consumer platform, but it must include direct P&L accountability and repeated operating decisions at city or regional level.

The board is seeking 28+ years of progressive responsibility and evidence of running a business or accountable portfolio of at least ₹2,200 crore with 450 or more employees. More important than title is judgement under conflicting incentives. You can explain when you withdrew from a market, when you protected partner income despite a short-term margin cost, and how you distinguished useful scale from subsidised volume. You have faced public scrutiny and can engage constructively with regulators without delegating the relationship to legal affairs.

This role requires weekly presence in Bengaluru and extensive travel across operating cities. A structured commute may be supported during the first quarter, but the long-term expectation is relocation. References will be asked about the decisions you personally made, the bad news you surfaced early and the leaders who became stronger under you.

Compensation and terms

The anticipated package is ₹5.0–7.5 crore fixed plus performance variable and long-term incentive, calibrated to verified scope. Measures include contribution quality, partner outcomes, safety and leadership rather than gross bookings alone. The permanent hybrid appointment is in Bengaluru, reporting to the Group Chief Executive and board. Notice up to six months can be accommodated.

Confidentiality

The client, exact city portfolio and operating data will be disclosed only after reciprocal interest, conflict clearance and a confidentiality undertaking. Figures in this brief are rounded and combine operating characteristics so that candidates can assess the challenge without identifying the enterprise. Please do not circulate the material or approach employees, drivers, regulators or investors speculatively.