Realtor.com® Adds New Leaders in Product Development and User Experience Design

"We are pleased to welcome Deepak and Steve to the team," said Cheong. "Deepak's rich product and engineering background and Steve's marketplace expertise are critical in helping realtor.com® create a seamless, cross-platform experience informed by consumer needs that will enable them to move confidently through every step of their home journey."

Deepak Thakral

Thakral is responsible for leading the professional experience for agents and brokers on realtor.com®, encompassing listing search results and display features, advertising, branding and lead generation, profiles for agents, brokers and teams as well as dashboard management. He also drives the company's media advertising experience across mobile, web and desktop platforms, including realtor.com®'s integration with the News Corp global advertising network as well as site-specific advertising.

"Realtor.com® has a unique set of audiences with a wide range of interests and needs, from buying, selling, owning and remodeling a home to securing a mortgage and home insurance," said Thakral. "I am excited to explore ways of optimizing that ecosystem and helping our customers deliver to our consumers the resources they need at their specific juncture of the home journey."

For real estate professionals, Thakral's team helps to ensure that the world-class experience on realtor.com® delivers unparalleled branding, advertising and lead solutions to market themselves and their listings to the more than 50 million users who visit realtor.com® on average each month, and helps empower professionals to manage their presence on realtor.com® easily and efficiently.

Thakral's experience in both product and engineering roles brings deep expertise in the engineering stack as well as across advertising technology, lead generation and mobile monetization. He spent the past four years in Silicon Valley startups including Chartboost, a monetization platform for mobile game apps powering more than 300,000 apps. Prior to Chartboost, Thakral spent six years product management and ad platforms at local marketing solutions provider YP. Thakral holds an MBA from the University of California - Los Angeles Anderson School of Management, a Masters of Science (MS) in Software Engineering from Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani and a Bachelor of Engineering (BE) in Mechanical Engineering from R.V. College of Engineering, Bangalore.

Steve Grove

Grove leads the realtor.com® user experience design team, working to connect consumers with real estate professionals by creating a cohesive, cross-device experience spanning the full home lifecycle. Grove's role focuses on accelerating the development of product designs and the company's end-user experiences.

"I see a lot of opportunity in improving the online home-buying experience," said Grove. "After spending much of my career developing marketplaces and connecting different types of people together through software, I am looking forward to creating an even better realtor.com® user experience for home buyers, agents and brokers."

Grove brings not only strong user experience and marketplace expertise but also product and business prowess, informed by his experience as one of eBay's first designers and as part of the design team at Oracle. Most recently, he led user-centered product and design teams for GoPro, Alibaba as well as the marketplace startup, Plastic Jungle. Grove holds a BA from San Jose State. 

About realtor.com®

Realtor.com® is the trusted resource for home buyers, sellers and dreamers, offering the most comprehensive source of for-sale properties, among competing national sites, and the information, tools and professional expertise to help people move confidently through every step of their home journey. It pioneered the world of digital real estate 20 years ago, and today helps make all things home simple, efficient and enjoyable. Realtor.com® is operated by News Corp [NASDAQ: NWS, NWSA] [ASX: NWS, NWSLV] subsidiary Move, Inc. under a perpetual license from the National Association of REALTORS®.

Contact: Tammy Lee, [email protected]

SOURCE realtor.com