Grab promotes tech leader to Chief Product Officer role

Grab has appointed Philipp Kandal as group chief product officer (CPO), starting this month.

Kandal will oversee the product, design and analytics teams and lead the product vision and strategy for Grab.

Specifically, Kandal will lead teams responsible for delivering products and strengthening Grab’s super-app ecosystem to create more value and build a product mix that offers affordable services.

Joining the company in 2019 to lead the engineering and data science teams for Geo (maps and location services), Kandal played the lead role in launching GrabMaps.

GrabMaps powers Grab services in all eight countries it operates in and helps the company save tens of millions of dollars in third-party mapping fees every year.

Grab’s co-founder, Tan Hooi Ling, said Kandal is a “strong executor and has successfully led several innovations for Grab, including the development of GrabMaps and initiatives that have made the Grab ecosystem more effective”.

Prior to joining Grab, Kandal co-founded and was the CTO of Skobbler, which was acquired by Silicon Valley-based Telenav, where he served as Senior VP for Engineering.