Grab appoints Suthen Thomas Paradatheth as group CTO

• Was Grab’s first technical lead when the company was founded
• Responsible for driving Grab’s tech vision, executive across company

Grab Holdings Ltd has announced that it has promoted Suthen Thomas Paradatheth (pic) to group chief technology officer (GCTO), effective Oct 1.

As Grab’s GCTO, Suthen will be responsible for driving Grab’s technology vision, strategy and execution across its deliveries, mobility, and financial services businesses, the company said in a statement. 

It said Suthen will focus on strengthening Grab’s technical infrastructure to enable deeper superapp synergies and faster product innovation, with the goal of providing partners and consumers with the most efficient, reliable and delightful marketplace for everyday services.

Tan Hooi Ling, co-founder of Grab, said Suthen's experience in technology and operations closely mirrors the nature of Grab’s business, which is about bridging offline services to online consumers. 

“His strong track record in developing highly scalable and robust systems, integrating multiple Grab services into one seamless superapp, and building high-performing teams around the world, give us confidence that he is the right leader to take our technical organisation to the next level,” said Tan.

Suthen was Grab’s first technical lead when the company was founded in 2012. Over the past decade, he held both technical and operational leadership roles and founded the business operations team.

As an engineering leader, Paradatheth led the development of many Grab products and platforms, which supported the rapid growth of Grab’s deliveries and mobility services from a small base to a multi-billion gross merchandise value business today.

In 2020, he was promoted to chief technology officer of mobility, automation and platform excellence, deliveries, and experiences. He led over 1,000 engineers, data scientists and technical program managers across various countries to design, build and optimise large-scale systems powering Grab’s biggest verticals. 

Under his leadership, his team created a unified tech platform to enable teams to use technical features across different lines of business for faster innovation and drove widespread adoption of artificial intelligence and automation for faster response to dynamic market conditions.

He is based in Singapore, Grab’s regional headquarters, and will continue to report directly to co-founder Tan Hooi Ling.

He will oversee Grab’s global network of eight research and development (R&D) centres, which draws talent from around the world to create impactful solutions for Southeast Asia.