Firstup Announces New Leaders to Advance Innovation and Customer Outcomes

Vinod Malhotra and Jen Franklin join Firstup as CTO and SVP, Customer Value

SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 18, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Firstup, the pioneer of intelligent communication and engagement platforms for the workforce, today announced the appointment of two proven leaders: Vinod Malhotra as Chief Technology Officer (CTO) and Jen Franklin as Senior Vice President, Customer Value.

These leaders bring superb track records in engineering excellence, agentic and generative AI, and customer success within the HR technology and employee experience landscapes, and with leading SaaS companies more broadly. Their expertise will support Firstup's continued focus on innovation and customer value, ensuring that the company's investments in technology help organizations unlock the full potential of their workforce communications – turning strategic and business imperatives into action and impact.

Advancing Innovation 

As CTO, Vinod Malhotra will lead Firstup's Engineering, AI/ML, CloudOps, and Support teams with a clear mandate to continue delivering enterprise-grade platform availability and scalability, advancing AI capabilities, and delivering innovation to market while maintaining quality and customer trust.

"Vinod joins at an important time for Firstup," said Bill Schuh, CEO of Firstup. "His experience and product-centric leadership will help us extend our position as the innovation leader in this market as we work toward our goal of building a company of consequence and delivering enduring value to our customers."

With more than 25 years of global product and engineering leadership, Malhotra has driven transformative growth and innovation, including significant revenue expansion at BlackLine, award-winning AI advancements at Perceptyx, and more than 150 percent year-over-year growth at Tally Solutions.

Strengthening Customer Value and Adoption

As Senior Vice President, Customer Value, Jen Franklin will lead Firstup's global Customer Value team to drive customer adoption of the Firstup platform and deliver tangible business results.

"Jen has a deep understanding of how to drive customer value, with expertise in the employee engagement and employee experience domains and a tremendous passion for the business problems we solve for our customers," said Schuh. "Her leadership will help ensure that we build and execute an integrated go-to-market motion that drives customer success and delivers  real value for our global user base."

Franklin joins Firstup from Medallia, where she drove strategic initiatives across key functions, including Customer Experience, Product, and Sales, as well as the company's Employee Experience product lines. Her deep industry expertise is further evidenced by her successful tenure in sales leadership roles at market-leading organizations like League, Achievers, and Taleo.

Foundation for the Future

Today's announcement comes just weeks after Firstup welcomed several additional members to its global leadership team. The company continues to invest in talent and innovation to ensure its platform evolves with customer needs and serves as a catalyst for their most critical business outcomes, such as improved employee engagement, efficiency, productivity, safety, and top-line revenue.

"This is a key step in advancing our mission and positioning Firstup for long-term success," said Schuh. "Vinod and Jen bring the leadership to support our customers, accelerate our innovation roadmap, and shape the future of employee communications and engagement."

About Firstup

Firstup is the leading platform for intelligent communication and engagement that power meaningful business outcomes. As a true "mission control" for workforce communications, Firstup is built for organizations with critically important frontline employees – delivering the right message to the right person at the right time. The platform enables hyper‑personalized, data-driven journeys across channels (email, mobile, intranet, digital signage and more), bringing alignment, clarity and engagement to every level of the organization.

With integrations to core HR, IT and business systems, Firstup reduces digital noise, surfaces actionable insights, strengthens employee experience and helps clients maximize productivity and retention. Trusted by large enterprises worldwide, Firstup transforms internal communication into measurable impact. Learn more at www.firstup.io.

SOURCE Firstup