Celsius Network named Tushar Nadkarni its Chief Growth & Product Officer on November 2, 2021, hiring a 20-year consumer technology executive who had built growth teams at Facebook and Uber1. Nadkarni took over the Hoboken, New Jersey lender's product, growth, design and marketing teams worldwide, reporting to Chief Executive Officer Alex Mashinsky.
Two of Celsius Network's 6 leadership moves on the record came in 2021
Leadership moves CryptoLately has verified at Celsius Network, by year
- 2021: 2
- 2022: 4
Moves: The Moves Ledger, CryptoLately's record of verified leadership moves, Oct. 3, 2016 to Oct. 2, 2026.
Read the chart as a table
| Item | Value |
|---|---|
| 2021 | 2 |
| 2022 | 4 |
27 executive hires on the record in 2021
Executive hires CryptoLately has verified, by year
- 2021: 27
- 2018, 2019, 2020, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025
Moves: The Moves Ledger, CryptoLately's record of verified leadership moves, Oct. 3, 2016 to Oct. 2, 2026.
Read the chart as a table
| Item | Value |
|---|---|
| 2018 | 8 |
| 2019 | 11 |
| 2020 | 12 |
| 2021 | 27 |
| 2022 | 37 |
| 2023 | 20 |
| 2024 | 39 |
| 2025 | 59 |
The move
Celsius framed the hire around scale. “As we prepare for the next chapter of our growth, I am excited to bring on a world-class leader like Tushar to scale Celsius from our first 1 million customers to our vision of 100 million customers,” Mashinsky said in the company's own announcement1. Nadkarni answered with a description of his own mandate. “I am thrilled to join Alex's leadership team, combining my love for building products with my passion for creating financial freedom for more people,” he said.
NJBIZ described Nadkarni's new job in plain terms. “In his role at the Hoboken-based firm, Tushar Nadkarni will oversee the company's product, growth, design and marketing teams across the globe,” Munoz wrote2.
Before and after the hire
Nadkarni arrived from Slingshot Growth Lab, where he had served as founder and managing partner since 2018. He helped client companies scale through experimentation and interface design1. Before Slingshot, he spent years at Uber and Facebook. Celsius's own release said he “played a pivotal role in the early years of their growth and monetization” there. He held a master's degree in engineering from Pennsylvania State University and an MBA from the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business.
Celsius had just under a million customers when Nadkarni joined, by Mashinsky's own count1. Mashinsky's pitch to Nadkarni rested on growing that base a hundredfold. Celsius planned to do so through a lending and borrowing platform it advertised as fee free.
What came next
Celsius stopped processing customer withdrawals in June 2022, seven months after Nadkarni's hire. Chapter 11 bankruptcy followed in July 20223. Mashinsky resigned as chief executive on September 27, 2022. He said in a statement on September 27 that he wanted to focus "on a plan that would provide the best outcome for creditors". CryptoSlate reported that Mashinsky had been “accused of promoting false information about the safety of users' funds when the crypto lender was on the brink of bankruptcy”. The hundred million customers Mashinsky promised Nadkarni stayed a promise.
Sources
- Celsius, "Celsius Announces the Appointment of Consumer and Financial Technology Executive Tushar Nadkarni as Chief Growth & Product Officer," PR Newswire (Celsius), Nov. 2, 2021, https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/celsius-announces-the-appointment-of-consumer-and-financial-technology-executive-tushar-nadkarni-as-chief-growth--product-officer-301414182.html
- Daniel J. Munoz, "Former Facebook, Uber exec to join Hoboken-based Celsius," NJBIZ, Nov. 2, 2021, https://web.archive.org/web/20211205044115/https://njbiz.com/former-facebook-uber-exec-to-join-hoboken-based-celsius/
- CryptoSlate, "Celsius CEO Alex Mashinsky resigns; CEL tanks," CryptoSlate, Sep. 27, 2022, https://cryptoslate.com/celsius-ceo-alex-mashinsky-resigns-cel-tanks/