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Varun Khona

Bangalore, Karnataka
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headout.com
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varun@headout.com
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+919916685393
V
K

Work Experience

Headout

Co-Founder & CEO
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Jan 2015 - Current

At Headout, our mission is to make your lives more exciting and amplify happiness by enabling you to head out and experience the world around you, in 3 clicks. The app shows you specially curated, fun activities happening nearby and gets you tickets at discounted rates, up until the last-minute. For the local service provider, we are the best way to access a new target audience and to sell unsold inventory, thereby increasing their profits effortlessly.

Headout has raised $12M from top investors in US & India and is available in 10 countries around the world. We're the only Indian company to have built a truly global consumer brand with 80%+ of our users and our revenues coming from the US, UK, EU, Middle East & Australia.

  • As the Founder & CEO, launched and scaled Headout from 0 to a $120 Million revenue run-rate in under 4 years.
  • Grown Headout 5x y-o-y in 2018 making it the fastest growing company in the industry, globally.
  • Built strategies that led Headout to become the only company in the industry with profitable unit economics - a rarity in the world of high growth tech startups.
  • Led our financing efforts to raise $12 Million from top-tier global investors such as Nexus Venture Partners, Version One Ventures, Angellist, 500 Startups, Kunal Bahl (Snapdeal, CEO), Neeraj Arora (Whatsapp) and others.
  • Managed the launch of Headout in US, UK, EU & UAE. Hired a team of 100 people and setup local offices to build our brand from the ground up in order to become an integral part of the city’s entertainment pulse.
  • Won various awards as the ‘Top Startup To Watch Out For’ in several publications.
  • As the Head of Product, built Headout’s app that has received recognition from Apple as the ‘Best App’ and been featured on the US App Store thrice.
  • Set up partnerships with large institutions like Google, Jet Airways, The Vatican, City of Rome, NYC & Co, Dubai Tourism, Universal Studios and others.
  • Received press coverage in Bloomberg, CNN, WSJ, Techcrunch, Economic Times, Times of India, Livemint, Yourstory and others.

Trippy

Founder & CEO
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Jan 2011 - Dec 2013

Founded Trippy as a solo founder at the age of 21. As my first startup & business project, Trippy was a bespoke trip planning website that helped people design once-in-a-lifetime vacations to beautifully remote and unexplored parts of the planet. It scaled to $650,000+ in revenue within 2 years, while being completely profitable. Over the lifetime of the business, I personally sold products covering 100+ cities across 4 continents. As the only founder, I was responsible for everything - from strategic vision to sales & product.

Goldman Sachs

Futures - Control & Trade Management Group
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2010 - 2010

I was an Analyst in the Listed Derivatives & Trade Management Group at Goldman Sachs. My role involved leading our team’s efforts on building and executing trading strategies for the EU markets.

Awards

  • Awarded as one of the ‘Top 35 Young Leaders in Travel’ globally by Phocuswright USA
  • Runner-up at Bloomberg TV India’s show ‘The Pitch’
  • Won Startup Weekend held at Yahoo by Kauffman Foundation
  • Headed Precipice 2010 - India’s first international collegiate business conclave held in Malaysia with a Limca record for the largest congregation of Indian students overseas.
  • Won the National Finals at Global Business Challenge in Singapore held by Chartered Institute of Management Accounts (CIMA)

Education

Bangalore University

Bachelors in Business Management Finance
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2007 - 2010