News Category: Company

To showcase different perspectives and give an inside look into Grubhub, we’re spotlighting leaders across the organization. This month, we caught up with Sanjay Uttam, Vice President of Engineering and Head of Marketplace Technology. 

A problem-solver with a deep background in platform transformation, Sanjay shares how he keeps his team adaptable, what’s exciting about the Wonder integration, and why being “stubborn” is a good thing.

A quick round to get to know Sanjay:

• Favorite Grubhub order: Chicken kebabs from High Mountain Mediterranean or Sushi 35 West near the NYC office.
  
• Favorite Podcast: I think it’s been at least five years since I listened to a podcast. I’m more of a quantum physics YouTube at midnight kind of person.
  
• Coffee or tea: Coffee. I drink a double espresso every morning. Nothing but water throughout the afternoon though.
  
• If not this career, what path would you have pursued: Probably cybersecurity. But if you asked 7-year-old me? Firefighter.
  
• Go-to productivity hack: My mornings are dedicated to deep thinking and problem solving. I’m at my sharpest in the mornings, so I like to work on things that require a lot of focus those first few hours. Afternoons are for meetings.
  
• Weekday routine: I wake up around the same time every day, drink coffee while watching CNBC, and then head into work or my home office.
  
• Weekend routine: Similar start—coffee minus CNBC—but then it’s either a race weekend with my track car or a day of housework and listening to music. I like balance.

You’ve had a deep and varied career in tech leadership across multiple industries—what initially drew you to Grubhub and made you come back?

When I first joined in 2014, the appeal was simple: I was already a loyal Seamless customer. Getting to work on something I was using every day—and that my friends were using constantly—was genuinely exciting.

Coming back years later, it wasn’t just about the work. It was about the people and the culture. I realized that what I was looking for already existed here: a place that values continuous improvement, introspection, and impact. I knew what Grubhub stood for, and I knew the kind of team I’d be joining again. That made the decision easy.

Can you walk us through your role and what your team is responsible for?

I lead Engineering across our consumer and merchant platforms, which includes everything that enables someone to place an order—and everything a merchant needs to fulfill it. That includes core product engineering, platform infrastructure, data science, site reliability, and operations.

It’s a broad scope, but we’re all united by the same goal: delivering a fast, reliable, and meaningful experience to our customers and partners.

You’ve led some major platform transformations and scaled high-impact initiatives—what’s been one of the most rewarding challenges here?

The Amazon Prime partnership stands out. It launched on Prime Day and required full alignment across Grubhub—specifically engineering, product, growth, care—and the same from Amazon’s side. It was one of those projects that had a clear “why,” and everyone showed up to make it happen. The coordination, complexity, and impact made it incredibly rewarding.

As we look to grow in 2025, what are some of the biggest focus areas for your team?

We’re focused on two tracks:

1. Customer and merchant experience: We’re constantly refining the ordering journey to help users find what they want faster while making sure our merchant partners have reliable, intuitive tools to operate effectively.
2. Developer experience: We’re creating a faster, more seamless way for engineers to build—introducing tools and workflows that improve delivery speed without compromising on quality.
   

As the Wonder integration takes shape, are there any efforts you’re particularly excited about that highlight what’s possible working together?

There’s a lot still evolving, but what excites me most is the shift in perspective. Wonder brings a different pace—a more experimental, startup-like energy. It’s challenging us to question how we work and explore how we can move faster while still keeping our standards high.

We’re also learning from each other’s strengths—whether it’s tools, processes, or ways of thinking. That kind of collaboration creates opportunities that are bigger than either company on its own.

From data science to infrastructure, your org is incredibly broad—how do you approach uniting such a wide-ranging team toward common goals?

It starts with alignment. We take the company’s high-level objectives and help each team map their own goals directly to them. I also make sure we’re getting the right people in the room early—especially when multiple teams are working on the same problem.

It might sound basic, but it works: when people understand how their work connects to something bigger, they stay focused, collaborative, and invested in the outcome.

What are you most proud of your team for?

I’m most proud of our ability to meet the moment. Time and time again, we’ve delivered under pressure—solving hard problems, moving quickly, and still hitting our bar for quality. That says a lot about the people here.

I’m also proud of the culture we’ve built. We talk about what didn’t go well. We share mistakes without blame. And we use those lessons to get better as a team.

With 20+ years leading in fast-paced tech environments, what’s a core leadership lesson that’s stuck with you?

Hire people who are curious and humble—people who want to learn from others and aren’t interested in being the smartest person in the room. When you build a team like that, everything else gets easier. The quality of your people drives the quality of your outcomes.

How do you help your teams stay adaptable and forward-thinking, especially with how fast the tech landscape changes?

If you hire the right people, you don’t have to make them adapt. What you do need to do is give them space—time to think, time to experiment, time to fail.

We try things. Not everything works. But some of our best ideas have come from experiments that would’ve seemed too risky if we were only aiming for a 100% success rate. I’d rather swing big and hit 10% of them—that’s how you get real innovation.

What’s something you’ve changed your mind about as a leader over the years?

I’m naturally introverted, and early in my career, I avoided building relationships outside of my core team. Now, I actively invest in those relationships ahead of time. It makes collaboration easier and more productive when something important comes up.

What advice would you give to someone looking to get into engineering?

Find something you’re genuinely passionate about. That passion will keep you stubborn—and you need to be stubborn in this field. You’ll stare at code for hours, chasing down a problem most people would walk away from. If you care about what you’re building, you’ll keep going. And that’s what separates good from great.

If you could jump into any other role at Grubhub for a day, what would it be—and why?

Business development. I love figuring out how to create value by connecting different systems—whether they’re technical or organizational. It feels like engineering at a strategic level. I’d just have to put on my extrovert hat for a meeting or two.

To showcase different perspectives and give an inside look into Grubhub, we’re spotlighting leaders across the organization. This month, we caught up with Brian Ryu, VP of Growth.

The Growth team plays a crucial role in Grubhub’s success— driving customer acquisition, retention, and loyalty while managing everything from performance marketing and CRM to pricing strategy, consumer insights, and brand development.

A quick round to get to know Brian: 

• Favorite Grubhub order: My kids love Chick-fil-A hash browns, so if you look at my order history, that takes the cake. But if I’m ordering for the whole family, we love Kiin Imm Thai.
• A favorite read: “Ego Free Leadership” by Brandon Black and Shane Hughes. It changed my approach to career management and workplace relationships.
• Weekend ritual: It’s pretty simple! I have two kids and love being able to spend time outdoors with them riding bikes, exploring parks, and spending quality time with friends.
• If not this career, then what? Engineering. That’s actually what I studied in undergrad and would love to be able to build things with my hands.
• Go-to productivity hack: I’m loving Gemini – especially for summarizing meeting notes, catching up on long email threads, and speeding up technical tasks like writing SQL.
• An average work day: I tend to have a lot of meetings throughout the day which requires me to switch topics a lot. To help stay focused, I set aside quiet time each morning to figure out the top one to three decisions I need to make that day. 
• An average weekend day: It’s all about family. We do our best to protect that time and our family strives to spend as much of it as we can distraction-free with our kids.

While you’re working in marketing now, your background is in financial services which a lot of folks might not know. Can you tell us about your career progression and how you ended up at Grubhub?

I started at Capital One straight out of college as a business analyst but did more than just the analysis. Something I took away from that job was the importance of having an ownership mentality and thinking through business problems end-to-end. For example, after developing program recommendations, I partnered with people across the organization, including operations, marketing, legal, data science, and more. I also spent time at the call centers listening to customer concerns that were related to the work I was doing. After a few years there, I went to business school and then into consulting at PwC. I jumped around a few different disciplines there that taught me a lot about client relationship management and becoming more comfortable navigating less familiar environments. 

I then went back to Capital One where I shifted over to performance marketing. This move wasn’t necessarily planned, however, I will forever be grateful for the folks that were willing to take a chance with me despite my lack of experience in marketing. I loved the problem sets and have been in a marketing role ever since.

I ended up at Grubhub for the opportunity to work somewhere scrappy and dynamic and with the scope that brought all of my prior experiences together. I was also excited to be in a role that allowed me to be even closer to the end consumer. I felt like it’d be exciting to work on something that you feel every single day. I was already ordering food delivery on my side. And funny enough, I actually started my food delivery journey with Seamless years ago when I lived in New York City. 

Growth covers a lot of ground — could you share more about what falls under that umbrella?

When people think of “Growth,” they might think of marketing first – but our team covers significantly more ground. Under the Growth umbrella, there are three core pillars:

1. Diner Growth. My team leads this area and is responsible for areas including Upper Funnel Media, Performance Marketing, CRM, Pricing Key Cities Strategy, Acquisition and Retention Analytics.
2. Loyalty and Marketing. This team drives the business across four primary pillars: (1) our Loyalty program, notably Grubhub+, to attract, convert, and retain our valued customers – including significant partnerships like with Amazon, American Express, Yelp and Lyft; (2) supporting B2B2C – Corporate, Campus, Merchant, and Driver – to nurture, acquire, and retain relationships across all facets of our business; (3) B2C Merchant Marketing; and (4) Diner Product Marketing.
3. Brand & Creative. Our Brand team is responsible for Brand Insights & Strategy, Brand Execution & Campaigns, as well as Creative Development which includes functions like Design, Copy, and Creative Operations and Production

Is there one project/initiative your team is focused on that you’re particularly excited about?

If I had to pick one, it would be the Seamless relaunch. It has maintained a strong brand in New York with a loyal customer base going back to the fact that it was one of the very first delivery apps, homegrown in New York. I’m excited to bring that sense of innovation and positivity back with newer customers who may not be as familiar with the brand, especially with all of the standout, value-driving campaigns we have for the top-tier restaurants in the NY Metro area.

What does success look like for your function?

At the highest level, it’s driving a step change in order growth, which breaks down into three focus areas:

1. Acquisition: Effectively using our media channels to deploy compelling messages, brand assets, and value props that showcase compelling reasons for prospects to explore our product and discover great restaurant, grocery, and convenience delivery experiences.
2. Loyalty: Partnering with our Loyalty team to develop differentiated programs and nurturing strategies to help our valued customers experience the Grubhub+ membership. The goal is to drive stickiness through delivering meaningful everyday value.
3. Retention: We aim to make it easy for all of our customers—Grubhub+ members or not—to discover great local merchants and find value, so we become their first choice for on-demand delivery. The Growth team drives this through various customer engagement efforts like emails, push notifications, in-app messaging,  promotional partnerships, and loyalty benefits like setting up events where customers can earn credits for repeat orders.

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever gotten, and how has it stuck with you as a leader?

Lead through asking questions. When problem-solving or taking on complex challenges, it’s important to start by building a common understanding across teams, and asking questions helps you do that across an organization and builds trust. On a different dimension, it also supports developing talent within your teams. Asking questions rather than immediately prescribing solutions encourages others to think more independently and build grounded recommendations. Most importantly, it drives a sense of ownership and responsibility over their area.

How do you work to help your team stay creative and come up with new ideas—especially in a fast-moving environment?

1. Even when things are changing rapidly around you, find the elements that remain consistent so you have an anchor to true back to amid change. 
2. Maintain a consistent problem-solving mindset in a fast-moving environment. When things are constantly changing around you, it can be hard to pivot and change your mind. You almost have to be clinical and disciplined about it to say, okay, the business is moving here. If I want to move with it, what do I need to do even if that means walking away from work I’ve already completed?
3. Be comfortable with some risk-taking. Don’t be so afraid to be wrong on certain things. Sometimes the greatest ideas come from trying new things, even when it makes you uncomfortable. You might fail five times, but if you find one idea that’s great, it can completely change the course that you’re on. Most decisions are not irreversible.

What’s something you’ve changed your mind about as a leader over the years?

My approach to risk-taking. Earlier on in my career, I would often encourage many of the agile principles like, “fail fast, learn fast.” I do believe I did a reasonable job eliciting that on my team, but I didn’t hold myself to the same bar since I wanted to have a high “win rate.”

This cautious, incremental approach only led to incremental results. It was challenging to find those breakthrough results since I was too afraid to go further. I had the fortune of having a manager push me out of my comfort zone. I started running more initiatives in parallel—making some bigger bets and moving faster to invest in encouraging tactics. I felt uncomfortable, and half the initiatives I tested during this period failed. But through that, there were a couple of breakthrough successes that led the business area to by 2-3x growth.

Final question: If you could have any other job in the company for a day, what would it be and why?

I think it would be interesting to work on the Merchant Network team and be out in the field. I know I would learn so much by being able to be face-to-face with the merchants that we serve.

I’ve been an analyst and in data-driven roles throughout my career but know through repeated experiences that the numbers don’t always tell you the whole story. Directly interacting with the customers you serve, whether it’s the merchants, the diner, drivers, or whoever else it may be, provide the color to reshape your work to directly meet their needs and solve their problems by understanding the real on the ground and how they perceive you.