Co-founder Krishnasamy exits Freshworks, led SaaS firm's tech operations

The executive left at least six months ago; decision was announced at a company town hall meeting

Shanmugam Krishnasamy, co-founder and chief technology officer (CTO) of Freshworks, has left the Nasdaq-listed software as a service (SaaS) company.

Sources said Krishnasamy’s exit happened at least six months ago but the news was not public. Media reports said on Wednesday Freshworks is operating without a chief technology officer for months now.

“Performing the role of CTO, his duty was to solve complex engineering problems for Freshworks. He is out of Freshworks now. The development happened almost six months ago. He wanted to travel and follow his passions like cars. He wanted to do it on his own terms,” said a source aware about the development. Girish Mathrubootham, the company’s co-founder and chief executive officer, announced Krishnasamy’s exit at a town hall meeting of employees a few months ago, said a report by Yourstory.

Other media reports said that Mathrubootham invited Krishnasamy to the stage at the meeting and announced the development. They added that the Ministry of Corporate Affairs documents indicated that Krishnasamy ceased to be a director on the board of Freshworks on July 6, 2022.

Freshworks is an eight-year-old start-up that started out as Freshdesk before being rebranded to its current name in 2017. In September 2021, Freshworks became the third Chennai-based tech company to be listed on the Nasdaq, after Cognizant and Sify. It became the first Indian SaaS company to do so. In December last year, the company laid off around 2 per cent, or 90 people, of its total workforce “to fuel business growth”.

Krishnasamy was the brains behind the company’s technical operations.