How Kunal Shah rose from unconventional founder to WhatsApp’s chief

For years,

Kunal Shah

has built companies around a simple question: What makes people change their behaviour? In 2010, when he founded FreeCharge, it was the dull act of mobile recharges. In 2018, when he founded Cred, it was the monthly ritual of paying credit card bills.

Now, Shah is headed to one of the world’s largest consumer products,

WhatsApp

, the Meta-owned messaging app used by billions of people across countries, languages and income groups.