Meta’s Chief Product Officer Chris Cox sent a cold email to CRED founder Kunal Shah seeking advice. That outreach kicked off a recruitment that ended with Shah taking over as WhatsApp’s global head, effective June 22, 2026.
Shah replaces Will Cathcart, who led WhatsApp for more than seven years and will now move to a different product role inside Meta. The leadership change comes as Meta invests $900 million in CRED, giving the fintech a post-money valuation of $4.5 billion.
Shah brings deep experience connecting commerce and payments. He founded FreeCharge and later CRED, which rewards credit-card users for on-time payments. WhatsApp has 3.3 billion monthly active users but has yet to convert that scale into major revenue. Under Cathcart, the app doubled its user base and added business messaging. Shah’s mandate is to weave artificial intelligence and commerce directly into the platform, leveraging CRED’s fintech infrastructure.
India remains WhatsApp’s largest market. Shah’s track record navigating its regulatory landscape gives Meta a seasoned operator who already understands the platform’s most critical audience.