Snap Inc. much-anticipated IPO is mere weeks away and it wouldn’t prefer gathering heat over an executive exit. But, there is nothing to worry about as the said departure isn’t related to the public offering but to airports and family time. One of Snap’s top ad executives Sriram Krishnan has decided to step down from his role nearly an year after joining the company.
This development was initially reported by Recode, who believed that the timing of the departure isn’t great. The company has just set out on its massive roadshow to convince investors to subscribe to their IPO and this could affect the same. But, Krishnan has taken to Twitter to confirm as well as clear the air surrounding his departure, especially that the same had nothing to do with their upcoming IPO.
The news of his departure immediately instigated the crowd to assume that Krishnan didn’t believe in Snap’s upcoming IPO. But, this theory was immediately debunked by him tweeting the real reason(s) for his departure from the company. He said that he was looking forward to less commutes and moving back to San Francisco to be closer to his wife Aarthi Ramamurthy, family and friends.
After a great year at Snap, I’ve decided to leave and move back to SF
to be closer to @aarthir, family and friends.— Sriram Krishnan (@sriramk) February 19, 2017
About a year ago, Snap had picked up Krishnan from Facebook to work on building out their Ads platform from the ground up. It also included building out APIs so that corporate businesses didn’t have to buy ads manually. In addition, he helped launch other necessary Ad tools, such as Custom Audiences and establish partnerships to connect advertisers and marketers. Thus, he was involved in maxing out the ad scale and performance of the platform.
But, one of the most tiring tasks of all was commuting between San Francisco and Los Angeles to work with the Snap team and spend time with family. Sources close to him suggest that he hated the commute and now plans to take some time off from work to start his family. He is also looking forward to support his wife in her entrepreneurial efforts, Lumoid, a camera and gadget rental startup.
Excited to do something new & different soon but for now, looking forward to less of airports and more of Netflix binging with @aarthir…
— Sriram Krishnan (@sriramk) February 19, 2017
Prior to him joining Snap, Krishnan spent a good three years working with Facebook to lay the foundation of their Audience Network. He helped lay all the ground work for the said product and grow it into a $1 billion run-rate business with thousands of publishers and millions of advertisers. He also helped build multiple mobile ad products, which drove significant revenues for the social media giant.
