Meet Deb

Senior Director of Product Management, at Salesforce
Ex-Founder & CEO of Criya (YC) | Ex-PayPal, Microsoft

Featured in Forbes, NYT, Tech Crunch, Harvard Business School, CBS, SXSW

Deb Dutta - sitting in a cozy living room with a fireplace, candle, and floral decorations, holding a stuffed animal.
Deb Dutta - keynote speaker at Google woman holding a smartphone on stage with a blue-lit backdrop, wearing a floral dress and necklace, with a lanyard badge.

About

Deb is a hands-on product executive. With a seasoned background spanning more than 15 years at leading tech companies including Salesforce, PayPal, Microsoft, and Hitachi, Deb brings a wealth of executive expertise in AI and strategic product management. She holds a Master's degree in Computer Science from Carnegie Mellon University and is a featured voice in leading publications like Forbes and TechCrunch. A prominent keynote speaker, she imparts her knowledge and insights at prestigious forums such as SXSW and Harvard Business School.

Deb is currently the Senior Director of Product Management at Salesforce leading a multi-million dollar portfolio for Salesforce’s Commerce/Retail cloud business. Prior to this, Deb was the Founder & CEO of Criya AI, a Mar-tech startup at the forefront of AI-driven hyper-personalized B2B marketing automation solutions, proudly backed by Y Combinator and Felicis. Deb spearheaded the vision, MVP and securing venture capital funding. Under her leadership, Criya AI implemented a pioneering Product-Led Growth strategy, engaging over 40,000 SMBs and launching a robust B2B SaaS product line that includes partnerships with SaaS companies and consulting firms.

As a passionate advocate for diversity in technology, Deb dedicates her efforts to mentoring emerging female leaders in product management, entrepreneurship, and fundraising, reinforcing her commitment to shaping the future landscape of the tech industry

Milestones

  • 15+ Years of experience leading Product Management at Salesforce, PayPal, Hitachi

    SENIOR DIRECTOR OF PRODUCT MANAGEMENT

    Salesforce

    • Spearheading Retail cloud for Salesforce’s Unified-Commerce vision.

    DIRECTOR OF PRODUCT MANAGEMENT

    PayPal

    • Agent Experiences Platform: Head of Product for PayPal’s Customer Success Agent Platform Organization, serving 450M+ customers, 33 million merchants and 12K+ internal users. Oversaw product strategy, road mapping, build vs. buy assessments, and launch operations, ensuring alignment with strategic business goals. Responsible for a multi-year transformation building AI/ML driven product strategy, leading global teams of PMs, engineers and UX, resulting in over $25M operational savings, yielding benefits in YoY productivity.
      P&L: Opex (Reduction) and product KPIs: Adoption, Avg handle time, Self Service containment, LTV

      Cultural Transformation & Team Development: Led a transformation Change Ambassador initiative implementing human-centered design playbook for 40 product management teams across global offices, fostering a culture of product excellence.

      AI/ML Personalization Platform: Pioneered 0-1 Enterprise Decision Platform providing AI & ML based Personalized recommendations. Led MVP adoption across Mobile home page, Loyalty/rewards, Marketing recommendations to SMBs.

      Fraud / Risk Platform: Led multi-year strategy to unify 17 PayPal's core products under next-gen Risk / Fraud Detection Platform leading 17 engineering teams serving PayPal's 450M user base, with ~500M in annual savings.

      Global Initiatives: Led the geo-enablement strategy for markets in India and China, with the multi-tenancy initiative, integrating PayPal Inc. companies such as Xoom, Venmo, and Braintree into a unified CRM.

    HEAD OF PRODUCT

    Hitachi Data Systems

    • Led 0-1 Product Management for Hitachi's first Video Analytics based IoT Smart City SaaS platform. Led demos with Hitachi’s C-suite, managed 25+ lean PMs & Engineers to drive all aspects of launch: MVP, API integrations, pricing, branding, & PR briefing, demos at trade shows

    • Delivered Sales Enablement training to Channel Partners, 150+ Sales & Pre-sales for HDS's top Public Safety accounts

  • Startup Vision & Leadership: Pioneered Criya AI, a MarTech AI startup from 0-1 developing MVP with the vision to revolutionize B2B marketing with AI driven hyper-personalization, led to rapid VC-backed growth, delivering 85% cost savings, engaging over 40,000 SMBs at zero CAC (in 2023). Launched successful B2B SaaS product, signing several enterprise contracts (in 2024).

    Product & Team: Recruited CTO and led a lean 15 person high growth engineering, design, business development, customer support & marketing team. Spearheaded Criya's proprietary RAG based AI model, LLM prompt engine and AI Agent workflows to deliver end to end personalized AI driven Campaign marketing in under 60 seconds.

    Investor relations: 4X valuation increase in 6 months with $5+ million raise, backed by top investors like Y Combinator and VCs (Felicis -Shopify, Canva, Notion).

    GTM strategy: Engineered a flywheel with PLG (zero CAC) followed by multi-prong content and event strategy - website SEO, social media, influencer UGC, brand marketing. Led strategic PR & built community on Socials & Newsletter (200K+), and launched CriyaCon - flagship AI conference.

    Revenue & Sales Operations: Founder-led sales, established a repeatable sales playbook, recruited first SDR & AE, trained customer support staff, SMB & Enterprise SaaS pricing.

  • Deb is a strong Advocate for Women in Tech, Product management & Leadership and is a Featured Speaker at several events.

    Public speaker
    - Harvard Business School 2025
    - SXSW 2025 main stage
    - Grace Hopper 2024
    - Keynote - Women in Product 2022,2024
    - CBS News 2023
    - IEEE 2023
    - Google I/O 2023
    - Carnegie Mellon guest lecture 2023,2024,2025
    - UC Berkeley / Haas guest lecture 2019
    - UC Santa Clara guest lecture 2019
    - Draper university startup judge 2024
    - UC Berkeley SAGE startup judge 2019
    - Keynote speaker at White Label expo Las Vegas 2021
    - Product leadership program - 2021
    - Run the world - virtual speaking engagement - 2020
    - Speaker ProductCon 2019
    - Speaker Product Event 2019
    - SAGE - young entrepreneurs event judge at UC Berkeley
    - HPE women in leadership panelist
    - Product School speaker (multiple events)
    - TV interview at RegalixTV
    - Expat Women Speaker (multiple events)
    - Launched the Women in tech platform at Hitachi Data Systems Bay Area chapter

  • Carnegie Mellon University: Advisory board for Carnegie Mellon Tech Entrepreneurship

  • Forbes: One of the earliest Forbes council members - on both Business and Non Profit councils.

Forbes logo on a black background

Deb’s Publications

Deb Dutta - media kit - holding a microphone with coaching-related words in the background, including leadership, business, skills, mentor, career, training, and professional.
Deb Dutta - Carnegie Mellon -Presenter in a room giving a presentation with slides on conferences, jobs, and investments, viewed by an audience.
Deb Dutta - in floral dress holding phone, standing on stage with a blue background and awards in the foreground.

Timeline

Founder & CEO, Criya AI - YC W22

2022 - 2025

Product Management Leader - PayPal, Hitachi

2015 - 2022

Engineer - Microsoft, Nokia, Cisco

Carnegie Mellon - Masters

2007-2009

2009 - 2015

Senior Director, Product - Salesforce

Mar 2025 - Present

Deb Dutta - Businesswoman seated in a pink chair with logos of Y Combinator, Harvard, SXSW, and other media outlets, featuring text about entrepreneur and CEO roles.
Deb Dutta - smiling in floral dress with text describing accomplishments as an entrepreneur and CEO, alongside logos of prominent organizations like Y Combinator and Harvard Business School.
Woman speaking on stage with text listing achievements and affiliations with organizations like Y Combinator and Harvard Business School.