Sridhar Ravichandran : Writings

Leaving SoundCloud / What’s next

Music is one of the most important products in the world. Or as Steven Wilson would say, one of the wonders of the world.

When I got on a plane to Berlin, Germany in Dec 2011, little did I know what a wild adventure it would be for the next 6 years. I am proud of the work we did at SoundCloud, and growing the product from a small but passionate creator community to the top 20 consumer apps in the world, reaching 175m+ users monthly. This is one of those memorable outcomes that will stay with me for a long time.

That said, the business of music is tricky. Entrenched business models, miniscule unit economics, complemented with competition from monopolistic tech giants – makes it a pretty improbable place to thrive. The early team at SoundCloud, starting from Alex and Eric had a refreshing, idealistic perspective on what could be the ‘music industry’, and this vision has always played a part to what’s kept me at SoundCloud.

I’ve been thinking about what’s next for a while now, but never jumped into something headlong as I didn’t quite see the right opportunity. Personally, I’ve always been fascinated by the arbitrage opportunities available in

– Healthcare

– Insurance

– Legacy Finance

After dozens of conversations with companies across the spectrum, I found the perfect fit. I just accepted a role at Zocdoc, leading their Mobile Product and Growth teams.

I’m very excited to join a group of incredibly smart, talented people – some of whom have done it before, but most importantly are hungry to push forward and change the way the healthcare system works for millions of people. Whether it’s about trimming the fat in the industry, reducing inefficiencies, or just creating better models of business – there’s plenty of opportunity, and Zocdoc is best positioned in the space to attack those problems at scale.

There’s never been a better (or more important) time to be working on healthcare, especially in America. Let’s do this.