Today, Groupon has officially found its new chief operating officer. The daily deals leader announced this afternoon that it has promoted Senior VP of Global Sales and Operations, Kal Raman, to COO, where he will continue to oversee the company’s global sales and operations and report to CEO Andrew Mason.
Raman fills a position that has remained vacant since September of last year, following the company’s awkward, short-lived dance with Margo Georgiadis, who spent five months as COO before returning to Google (from whence she came). Since then, Mason has unofficially overseen sales and operations, before handing the reins to Raman.
The new COO has seen a quick ascension since joining Groupon. He joined the company in April as the Senior VP of the Americas and was quickly promoted to Senior VP of Global Sales, a role he assumed in August. Seven months, two big promotions.
Prior to joining Groupon, Raman was the Vice President of Global Fulfillment at eBay. Before that, the exec served as the CEO of GlobalScholar and Drugstore.com, was a VP at Amazon and held a number of management roles at Walmart.
“In a very short time, Kal has had a significant impact on increasing the number and quality of local businesses using the Groupon platform to the benefit of Groupon customers around the world,
Groupon CEO Andrew Mason said in a statement. “We are already seeing progress in Europe and Kal will be instrumental in leading our company as we deploy tools and technologies that will help us continue to grow both Groupon and the categories in which we operate.”
Raman has a lot of work in front of him. Not only will he be tasked with helping the company gain a foothold in Europe and expand its brand overseas, along with improving deal selection among other things — but, really, to help Groupon make the transition from high-growth startup to a real, viable public company. The company has continued to disappoint (and underachieve) since going public, so it’s now Raman’s job to help Groupon diversify and shift focus away from its familiar daily-deal territory to more profitable pastures — like Groupon Goods.
Official announcement here.
Photo Credit: Business Wire