"My career choices have been driven by curiosity, continually learning, continuous improvement and applying that to new problems. I started in technology, which is what gives me this lens of user-first thinking, and moving backwards from user experience. The time I spent in Amazon, in the early days of the consumables business, gives me insight into what scaling a platform very quickly needs to look like from the brand and platform side. But the time I spent in CPG at Unilever gave me empathy for people in brand stewardship roles, because you have to grow the brand for the long term."
""Year One was about building something very quickly and partnering with early winning brands, and Year Two was understanding what drove tremendous scale very quickly, and scaling that methodology more," Salpekar said. "Year Three is about amplifying that impact.""
""I'm trained in building systems," Salpekar said. "At Microsoft and then Amazon, that's what I practiced.""
Ajay Salpekar is an engineer by training who built systems at Microsoft and Amazon before moving into commercial roles and CPG at Unilever. He joined TikTok six months before the platform launched its e-commerce arm and created a playbook that changed beauty retail dynamics. Year One prioritized rapid build and partnerships with early winning brands. Year Two focused on identifying and scaling drivers of rapid growth. Year Three centers on amplifying that impact to give viral brands longevity. His approach combines user-first engineering, platform scaling expertise, and empathy for long-term brand stewardship.
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