Ramesh Akula

Product Management leader with 15+ years of end-to-end ownership across financial services, AI-enabled decisioning, and enterprise transformation. Proven track record compressing idea-to-production cycle time, scaling agile delivery operating models, and driving measurable outcomes — including 30% lead-time reduction, 95% platform adoption, $1M+ first-year revenue, and 10,000+ daily transactions at 99.9% uptime. Transferable expertise in regulated financial risk assessment, evidence-based decisioning, and workflow modernization applicable to consumer/home lending product transformation.

Experienced leading 20+ cross-functional product, engineering, data science, design, and operations teams in matrixed US-India environments; align executive stakeholders on roadmap trade-offs, investment cases, risk posture, and launch readiness. Adept at leveraging AI/ML responsibly — including AWS SageMaker and Azure ML — to accelerate discovery, forecasting, and customer experience.

Senior Product Manager – Enterprise Decisioning & Analytics Platform at Zinnia Technology Solutions (2025-12 – Present)

Zinnia is North America's leading L&A technology company, processing 3M+ applications annually for 15+ of the largest insurance carriers — operating at the intersection of financial services, medical data, and AI-driven decisioning.

• Own product strategy, vision, and executive-aligned outcome-driven roadmap for TPP 8.x, an AI-powered decisioning platform spanning multiple carriers, business models, and product lines; maintain a living, data-backed roadmap that sequences value and reflects market and customer insights.
• Lead discovery, usability testing, and requirements definition for enterprise features spanning data ingestion, workflow configuration, risk decisioning, document/evidence workspace, and UX improvements; validate assumptions through rapid MVP experiments and quantified learning.
• Own and refine the product backlog using JIRA with distributed engineering pods; facilitate Scrum ceremonies (sprint planning, stand-ups, reviews, retrospectives) that drive focus, accountability, and continuous improvement; break complex platform capabilities into sequenced, release-ready user stories and acceptance criteria.
• Define MVP scope, success metrics, execution trade-offs, and value propositions for scalable features, balancing customer value, cost, risk posture, reliability, and delivery feasibility; instrument features and publish outcome dashboards per sprint to drive data-driven decisions.
• Partner with Engineering, Data Science, Architecture, Legal, and global product leadership to translate technical capabilities into compliant, resilient, user-centered product outcomes; communicate progress, risks, and upcoming priorities with candor and clarity to executive stakeholders.
• Champion new ideas and challenge legacy processes to transform decisioning operations; establish KPIs and sprint health indicators across delivery velocity, quality, release readiness, and business impact, using AI-driven insights where appropriate to enhance prioritization and forecasting.

Data Product Manager – Financial Risk Analytics & AI Platform at Swiss Re Global Solutions India (2022-10 – 2025-08)

Swiss Re's Rapid Damage Assessment (RDA) platform is an AI-driven SaaS solution for claims financial impact quantification — combining proprietary hazard models, geospatial analytics, satellite imagery, and deep learning to support end-to-end financial loss assessment for large-scale catastrophe events.

• Owned end-to-end product lifecycle for RDA from PoC to production SaaS platform, compressing idea-to-impact cycle time by 30% and scaling to 10,000+ daily risk assessments globally with 99.9% uptime.
• Led product discovery, market research, competitive analysis, roadmap definition, backlog sequencing, launch readiness, and post-launch adoption for AI-enabled financial operations; maintained a data-backed roadmap sequenced by value and speed-to-impact.
• Drove 30% reduction in client-initiated support contacts by designing self-service onboarding frameworks, guided reporting workflows, and repeatable enablement playbooks adopted by 50+ carrier clients, improving adoption and completion without increasing support burden.
• Built three AI/ML investment-ready business cases with $2M+ projected incremental revenue pipeline, aligning executive stakeholders on prioritization and launch sequencing; launched the commercial RDA platform delivering $1M+ first-year revenue.
• Served as primary business-to-data science bridge, defining model validation metrics, operational workflows, and business rules for damage severity classification using deep learning on aerial imagery; applied AI/ML responsibly, adhering to governance frameworks and applying human judgment to maintain quality.
• Led cross-functional team of 20+ across product, engineering, data science, operations, and client stakeholders in a matrixed US-India delivery model; directly managed and mentored 5 product and analytics professionals.
• Built product success measures across adoption, operational workflow impact, reliability, support load, and revenue contribution; published outcome dashboards to enable value-based, data-driven prioritization across sprints and releases.

Lead Product Consultant – Digital Products & Enterprise Transformation at Tata Consultancy Services (2010-06 – 2022-09)

Led product analysis and product definition for multi-million-dollar digital transformation programs for Fortune 500 clients in financial services, insurance, and aviation sectors in the US.

• Led requirements strategy and delivery for an $8M legacy modernization program that consolidated five policy systems into a modern digital ecosystem, driving 95% platform adoption across all impacted user groups.
• Led API integration requirements for third-party partner channels, increasing partner sales volume by 30% and improving customer acquisition automation; led agile backlog of 200+ user stories, acceptance criteria, and release-sequencing plans.
• Defined migration, archival, and access requirements for historical policy data, supporting business continuity, compliance, and operational usability after legacy decommissioning.
• Partnered with business stakeholders, engineering, QA, and implementation teams across discovery, solution design, UAT, release planning, and deployment; facilitated agile ceremonies to maintain delivery pace and cross-functional alignment.
• Defined product scope, user journeys, process maps, and business requirements for a communication platform used by 5,000+ flight crew members; partnered with UX and engineering teams through Figma-supported design sprints, reducing project planning cycle time by 20% and accelerating executive alignment.
• Managed stakeholder expectations and delivery outcomes, achieving 90% alignment between business objectives and implemented functionality.
• Improved quote, authentication, and agent workflow processes by 15% through API design sessions, end-to-end solution documentation, and backlog refinement; reduced UAT defects by 10% by strengthening acceptance criteria, test coverage, and release validation.
• Orchestrated end-to-end UAT cycles, secured business sign-off, and mentored five associate product analysts in delivery discipline and customer-centric product thinking.

PGDM in MBA – SDMIMD

Certified Business Analyst Professional in CBAP – IIBA

Product Owner Certification in PO – IBM

Lean Foundation – Swiss Re