Yohan Sudheer
About
I'm Yohan Sudheer.
I’ve spent the last decade helping startups and tech companies launch, scale, bring new products to the market, and hire top talent. I live and operate in the intersection of growth x operations.
Most recently, I was Co-founder, Head of Growth & Ops at FishHook(now ScaleDock)––a growth consulting firm that helps early-stage companies with positioning, GTM & growth. We would typically pick 2-3 companies each year and become their de-facto CMO and Marketing team, helping them solve their biggest growth problems. FishHook went on to service 25+ startups from across the world, including Dicer (AI), Sats (FinTech), FinBox (FinTech), DoneDeal (Platform), and more.
While at FishHook, as part of our special projects, we incubated The Startup Growth Hour, a marketing-mentorship program for startups. Backed by WeWork, the Program had 3 editions with over 200+ applicants and impacted 100+ startups from Europe, US and India.
I also co-founded Nack, an EdTech platform to create personalized micro-skill training to employees in real-time. We had 20+ paid pilots and a major distribution deal with a public company. We decided to sunset the project after failing to validate our assumptions.
Before that, I was Head of Marketing @ 40 Parables––the No.1 marketing agency for religious & non-profit tech. At 40P, I managed the team that worked on some of the fastest-growing religious tech products, including BibleAppForKids, Dwell, Kindrid, and more.
Before that, I was Marketing Manager @ HealthSignz––an IoT-focused Healthtech startup.
Current areas of curiousity
I'm very curious about these problems and sectors. If you're working on or thinking deeply about any of them, please write to me at yohansudheer@gmail.com.
Cross-Border Payments
It's still a huge ordeal making international wire transfers—especially if you are sending money from countries with tighter regulations around money moving outside their borders. I assume senders in countries like India, Pakistan, Russia, etc., will not have a straightforward self-serve way of sending money abroad. Most will be forced to use a third-party service or brokers with huge fees and shady exchange rates.
Access to USD Banking for Non-US Residents
Access to a USD bank account can be a game-changer for foreign residents, especially small-business owners. It allows them to receive payments and make transfers in USD, protect their savings from rising inflation rates, invest in US assets, and purchase US software.
Example: Over 90% of US software is inaccessible to Indian businesses because of new regulations around the use of Indian debit/credit cards for foreign merchants. This can be solved by opening up access to USD banking irrespective of US residency.
Neo-Banking for International Students
I'm trying to understand banking behavior for foreign students studying in the US. There is space in the market for a Neo-bank that foreign students start using once they confirm admission to college while still in their home country. This benefits the student, who can be better set up once they land in the United States and can be a successful business, as people tend to stay with the same bank for several years, if not their entire lifetime.
Connecting US Companies with Non-Technical Talent in India, Africa, Philippines
There is a significant rise in the quality of non-technical talent (Design, HR, Operations, Marketing, Sales) coming from countries like India, Nigeria, Kenya, Bangladesh, etc. This could be an unfair advantage for a US company that needs to focus on profitability, especially in volatile financial markets.
Apprentice Program for High Schoolers Who Opt-Out of College
More and more high schoolers will opt-out of a college degree and try to join the workforce. More and more companies will remove a college degree as a requirement for new applicants. There is space for a company (or several) that helps high school graduates get accepted into an apprentice program with a company (or an individual within the company), which eventually translates to a full-time job.
This is pretty common in Europe, especially Germany, but will become popular in the US within the next 10 years.
YCombinator for Musicians
I'd love to see an accelerator-style program that takes a select group of musicians through a 3-month program featuring sessions from renowned producers, songwriters, marketers, etc. Musicians get access to a fully-decked studio and are expected to launch an EP by the end of the program. A final demo-day style event featuring each musician with enough press, sponsors, and labels to successfully launch any new artist.
