Gopuff tech chief is out after felony charges

Sreekant Sreenivasan Kotay, a prominent software executive in Philadelphia, is out as chief technology officer of Gopuff, the Philadelphia-based home-delivery company, following his arraignment last month on felony charges of methamphetamine possession with intent to distribute and cocaine possession, and a domestic-violence misdemeanor.

“Kotay’s employment with Gopuff was terminated on Friday,” spokesperson Brigid Gorham said in an email Monday. She declined to provide other details, noting the company doesn’t comment on personnel issues.

People familiar with the firing said Kotay’s departure followed posts describing his Sept. 9 arraignment on a message board frequented by Gopuff employees.

Kotay was arrested and charged in June in St. Petersburg, Fla., where he lives, according to Broward County court records.

Kotay pleaded not guilty to the drug charges and a charge of battery with intent to “cause bodily harm.” He was allowed to post a bond and subjected to a domestic-violence order prohibiting contact with the person he was accused of striking.

A trial date has not been set.

Kotay, who goes by the nickname Sree, was reappointed to the CTO job last year after a stint in the same position in 2017-2019. In between, he held several other positions, including CTO at hiring startup Vette.

Gopuff is an app-based delivery service specializing in snacks, packaged drinks, groceries and household items. Founded by a pair of Drexel University undergraduates in 2013, the company has raised more than $5 billion from Disney chairman Bob Iger, Japan-based Softbank, and other large tech investors. Founders and investors had hoped to profit from an initial public stock offering (IPO) or sale to larger delivery company, but that has not happened.

After expanding to cities and college towns across the U.S. and parts of Europe in the late 2010s and into the pandemic, Gopuff has closed some centers and cut costs in the past few years, including jobs at its Spring Garden Street headquarters, in an attempt to become profitable for the long-term even if a blockbuster sale does not materialize.

Kotay was previously chief software architect and, briefly, chief technology officer at Comcast, the Philadelphia-based cable, entertainment, theme park and Internet company. His 10-year tenure ended with his departure in 2017 for personal reasons, the company said at the time.

At Comcast, Kotay was credited with developing the business strategy and technology that enabled the company to escalate its Internet-based video distribution, a key step toward moving video from dependence on cables wired into customers’ televisions, to Internet-based viewing.

As Comcast’s chief software architect before his promotion to CTO, Kotay was named technology executive of the year by Multichannel News in 2014. He worked earlier at the pioneering mass-market Internet service America Online.