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Nikhil (Nik) Sathe

Chief Technology Officer at Blackhawk Network (BHN)
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Nik Sathe is the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) at Blackhawk Network (BHN) where he leads the company’s global technology strategy and teams in the expansion of its global footprint and capabilities in payments and payment technologies.

A veteran technology executive, Sathe has built, led and scaled teams and platforms across technology and financial services. Most recently, he served as vice president of engineering for Google Nest, where he was responsible for the strategy, design and development of Google's Nest, Chromecast and Home branded products and Smart Home ecosystem. Previously, Sathe was CTO of American Express, co-CTO at PayPal, and part of Google’s Wallet team, giving him experience and insight into the changing payments landscape.

Sathe has prior experience at JP Morgan Chase and several start-up and public technology/software companies. He has a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering from Lafayette College and serves as an advisor to technology start-ups and entrepreneurs.

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  • Focus on the “why” to help stakeholders understand the benefit of your proposals. You shouldn’t spend too much time discussing the problem, but if you do, articulate the impediments it creates and the impact to customers and the business. Spend time painting a picture of the future your proposal will enable—such as enhanced velocity, more reliable systems and increased efficiency—things stakeholders care about.

  • Traditional CTO responsibilities—platform cost, availability, scale and resilience—are table stakes but are still the subject of frequent conversations in the C-suite. Today’s CTOs need to be commercially minded, especially those working for B2B and enterprise companies whose products are going to be consumed through APIs and integrations. Conversations about these concepts, as well as enabling or disruptive artificial intelligence technologies and cybersecurity, should be led by today’s CTOs.

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