Luigi Mallardo

Hi, I’m Luigi, first of all a Father and second an ex Basketball pro turned into Growth and Transformation Executive, Go-To-Market Coach and Advisor with a track record of helping companies adopt SaaS and SaaS-like Customer-Centric business models focused on recurring revenue.

The last 20 years I’ve had the privilege to live in 4 countries, work in 3 languages and gain experience in both Fortune 500 corporations and tech scaleups, primarily Software as a Service (SaaS) in Europe, US and Latin America.

Based in Barcelona.

It all started with a failure.

So far I’ve enjoyed a fulfilling and diverse professional and life journey.

However, it started with a failure.

In my twenties I was a basketball pro but I failed compared to what insiders (and myself) expected from me.

I had a great talent and reached no more than 15% of what I could have achieved.

It was the lack of luck but most of all it was my lack of resilience and clarity of mind.

I learned the secret for success is a combination of courage, obsession with continuous improvement and a bit of luck.

Global Consumer Brands and Innovation.

Between 2000 and 2010 I served the International Marketing Boards of brands like Kellogg’s, Lipton, Knorr, Magnum,

Rama and Johnson & Johnson on projects of Global Brand Development and Innovation.

Based in London, I did for example quite a lot of work to help Unilever create the green tea category and develop the global Lipton brand.

I also helped Johnson & Johnson to defend market share against Private Label & Discounter Retailers in Europe.

I learned the big picture and the laws of consumer and shopper behavior.

Revenue Leadership, Customer-Centric Transformation and SaaS.

In 2010 I walked away from Corporate as I wanted to redesign my business life towards digital technologies and VC-backed startups.

Since then, I’ve had various roles as VP Sales, Chief Revenue Officer, Advisor, Operational Coach, and Business Angel in SaaS scaleups in London, Barcelona and San Francisco. Focusing mainly on Enterprise and Middle Market across several technologies and industries.

I learned the secret for most tech scaleups is to be compatible with the incumbents, not fighting necessarily to replace them.

Now I:

• Run SaaSup, a proven hands-on Customer-Centric Strategic and Operating System for SaaS and SaaS-like revenue growth, that has helped to build and grow healthily around 20 successful companies like British American Tobacco for the scaleup of GLO, Lifull Connect and Cloud Academy amongst others.
• Coach and Advise:
  • SaaS CEOs and their direct teams on revenue strategy, processes and execution.
  • CEOs and Boards of Non-SaaS companies on how to adopt SaaS-like Customer-Centric models.
• Enjoy the exit we had in Woffu (we sold the company in 2022 to the Nordics decacorn Visma), where I was one of the top 5 shareholders as I acted from the start of the business as Mentor and Business Angel, then I became operative as Chief Revenue Officer and Board Member,  and finally I keep on as Advisor of the CEO after the exit.
• Keep on continuous research, experimentation and sharing mode:
  • Teaching regularly at IE Business School to non-tech entrepreneurs and CEOs about SaaS models.
  • Curating personally a Blog and the SaaSification newsletter.
  • I’m a pioneer member of Pavilion (formerly Revenue Collective) in Europe and founder of the Barcelona Chapter.

I’m also on Linkedin and Twitter if you’d like to follow me.