Hi, I'm Karunakaran Nagarajan, a veterinarian turned Salary Growth Expert. 

🔹 My Mission:
I’m on a mission to help 1 lakh Tamil working professionals become 'Intrapreneurs & Leaders' so that they can get paid more and promoted faster. I founded the “Tamil Innovators Academy” community in 2023 to achieve this mission. Today, we are a thriving community of 1,000+ paid members and growing strong. 💪

🔹 Who is an Intrapreneur?
An Intrapreneur is a new breed of working professional who thinks and acts like an entrepreneur within a company. 🚀

🔹 Results that speak for themselves:
Many of my students have achieved multiple job offers and salary hikes ranging from 50% to 400%! 💰

I can help you with:

🌈 Identifying the right industry, company, boss, and high-income role
🌈 Understanding your natural strengths and key skills
🌈 Creating a winning resume and leveraging the power of LinkedIn
🌈 Mastering job search techniques and proven methods to land interviews
🌈 Excelling in interviews, negotiating salaries, and securing multiple high-paying job offers
🌈 Developing essential soft skills, including communication, goal setting, time management, leadership, people management, and problem-solving
🌈 Becoming an irresistible intrapreneur that every company wants to hire
🌈 Establishing yourself as a thought leader in your industry

🔹 My Backstory:

Before becoming a Salary Growth Expert, I worked as a Business Head at CavinKare for 5+ years. During my journey, I:

✅ Launched & Scaled a Startup: From 0 to ₹2 crore/year business model 🚀 
✅ Turned Around a Business: From a loss of ₹80 lakh to a profit of ₹3 crore/year 💡 
✅ Built a Strong Team: Grew from a 10-member team to 120 members while developing five first-time leaders 👥 

These experiences shaped my ability to mentor and empower tamil working professionals like you. 🌟

If you’d like to connect with me, drop me an email at connect@drkarunakaran.com. Let me help you take your career to new heights! 📩

Karunakaran Nagarajan

David Olusegun

Hi 👋🏿

I’m David. I’m driven by faith and committed to purpose. My work is simple: build and invest in consumer brands that make lives better and leave a positive legacy.

For over a decade, I’ve worked across CPG, entertainment, and media with global players.

I'm also privileged to advise founders and corporations on building products that truly serve people and I speak on faith, entrepreneurship and brand leadership with a focus on real-world impact and integrity.

Honoured to be recognised by Powerful Media, Music Week, KPMG Entrepreneur of the Year, HSBC x Black Business Week Top Entrepreneur and the UK’s Top 100 African Business Leaders, but the mission stays the same: help brands serve people, do good with excellence and integrity and honour God.

Reach My Team👇🏾

📧 Speaking & Commercial: do@onetwelveagency.com
📧 Press Enquiries: press@howtobeiconic.co

Co-Founder & Co-CEO

CCV is a venture builder that partners with purpose-driven creators to launch global CPG brands. We are a creative-led team with strong end-to-end commercial expertise that provides the complete infrastructure to launch, build and scale these pioneering brands.

Our goal is to give our clients the opportunity to build something bigger than their personal brand, receive ownership rather than just another endorsement deal and leverage their following into a long-term future through building impactful businesses.

Our operating model is to work together with the creator as a co-founding team and enable them with the right infrastructure, tools, support, and capital. We love working with creators to change the world, one brand at a time. We believe it’s time we build businesses that shift the power paradigm to the hands of the creators. It’s what gets us up in the morning, it’s in our DNA and we are irretrievably obsessed with collective success by working with CCV you’ll be working with vested partners committed to global success!

This is your reminder that Jesus loves you.
 
Not someday. Not when you’re perfect. Not when you surrender your life to Him.

He always has, and He always will.

“But God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” — Romans 5:8

Building and Investing in Purpose-Driven Consumer Brands | Angel Investor | Keynote Speaker

Mary S.

Someone once asked me, ‘Why are you sharing the gospel on LinkedIn? Isn’t this a professional platform?’

But that’s exactly the point.

My faith isn’t separate from my work. It’s the whole reason behind my existence.

As Christians, we’re not just called to be in spaces, we’re called to represent Christ in them. The gospel is meant to spread in every room we step into.

“Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation.” — Mark 16:15

“But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.” — Matthew 6:33

Putting Jesus first doesn’t mean everything suddenly works out.

It means you’re not figuring life out on your own anymore.

It means peace, even when things feel uncertain.

It means trusting His direction over your emotions.

Happy Sunday🙏🏾

I don’t know who needs to hear this today, but God will never walk away from you. 

Even in the moments when things feel quiet, confusing, or heavy, His presence has never left your side. 

When I was mourning my brother, there were moments I thought God was distant.

But remember what Jesus said in John 16:33 — “In this world you will have trouble.” Even in the middle of that pain, God carried me through that phase.

“I will never leave you nor forsake you.” — Hebrews 13:5

A husband-and-wife team's brand just got acquired by Henkel for $693M 

➡️ The brand: Not Your Mother's Haircare 
➡️ The founders: Rocky and Bethany Pagliarulo
➡️ The journey: 2010 launch → 2019 PE investment → 2025 exit at $693M
➡️ The revenue: $210M (growing 40% annually)

They spotted a gap most legacy brands ignored: Young women wanted products that felt cool and modern, but still affordable.

Not clinical. Not luxury. Not boring.

So they built directly into that white space.

They leaned early into categories like dry shampoo, long before it became mainstream, and packaged it with bold branding that stood out on crowded shelves like Walmart and Target.

While legacy players were busy protecting their premium lines, Not Your Mother's Haircare quietly became the brand that younger consumers actually reached for.

Now here’s what makes this fascinating: the acquisition price was never disclosed. 

Barclays estimated $927M at 4.4x revenue. Industry sources said that was wrong.

Check my newsletter to see how I reverse-engineered the actual deal value.

Because buried in the math is a masterclass in how to build a mass-market consumer brand that trades at premium multiples whilst selling at Walmart for $5.99.

Link: https://lnkd.in/ezXf-D42

“African Designers are Greedy”
 
 I saw a viral video a few weeks ago where a lady called out the industry, claiming that designers living on the continent have no business charging $10,000 and above.

But here’s the reality: We are witnessing the birth of the African Luxury Renaissance. 

For too long, the world (and even our own) expected African craftsmanship to be cheap because it was "local." 

We celebrated European houses charging $50k for couture while expecting African artisans to work for peanuts.

The idea that African excellence should be "affordable" by default is a mindset we need to outgrow. 

African fashion is an investment in art, heritage, and a thriving economy. 

Swipe through to see the real numbers behind the African fashion industry and why the "greedy" narrative just doesn't hold up statistically.

Is African Fashion Too Expensive?

I wrote my own obituary yesterday, and it made my skin crawl. 

"Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom." - Psalm 90:12

I wrote it, not because I'm morbid and not because I'm planning to go anywhere. 

But because I needed to see what my life would look like if I died today, and what I want it to look like when I actually do.

Reading it made me feel sick. But it was honest.

Then I wrote the obituary I want. 
The one that reflects who I'm becoming, not who I've been. 
The one that makes my time on earth matter.

Today, you're going to do the same.

Your obituary is the ultimate business plan. It's the clearest possible statement of what actually matters. 

It's impossible to read without confronting the gap between who you are and who you could be.

When you truly accept that you're going to die, not someday, but definitely, you start making different decisions. 

Urgent decisions. Meaningful decisions.
You stop waiting for permission and start taking action.

Let me show you two obituaries. 

Both for the same person. Both are completely accurate. Both written by someone who knew them intimately themselves.

Click here to find it in the full issue of this week's newsletter: https://lnkd.in/edWMUN65

4 out of the 5 fastest-growing economies in the world right now are in Africa.

Yet Africa receives less than 3% of global private equity flow.

Why the disconnect?

Most global capital is still deployed based on 20th-century perceptions of volatility. 

But look closer at the "Value Drivers" behind these numbers:

✅ Resource Monetisation: Guinea isn't just growing; it's unlocking the Simandou iron ore deposit—the world's largest untapped high-grade reserve.

✅ Infrastructure Catalysts: In Uganda, growth is anchored by the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP), creating a massive regional multiplier effect.

✅ The "Base Effect" Rebound: While countries like South Sudan and Sudan are recovering from deep contractions, the speed of their return signals a resilient underlying economic pulse.

The Africa Risk Premium is often more about a lack of data and local expertise than it is about actual default probability.

The real alpha in the next decade won't be found in saturated Western markets. It will be found in the delta between perceived risk and actual expansion.

The engine of global growth has moved.

Follow me on X to see more African business and investment insights: https://lnkd.in/emaBdY_4

You Need to Get Comfortable Being the Least Experienced in The Room‼️

Why?

Your network is your net worth and being bold in rooms you don't belong can change everything.

This week, the Nigerian President and his delegation came to the UK. 

High-level politicians, business leaders, ministers, and power brokers all in one city for five days.

I had one mission: Get in every room possible and be bold about what I'm building.

The result?  Seven meetings that could reshape my African expansion plans. Three potential partnerships. Two introductions that I've been trying to get for two years.

But here's what almost didn't happen: On Thursday evening, after a full day of back-to-back meetings, there was a dinner. 

I was exhausted. My brain was fried. Every part of me wanted to go home.

I almost didn't go.

That dinner led to the most important conversation of the week.

Let's be honest about something: Most of the rooms I was in this week, I had no business being in.

I wasn't the biggest name. 
I wasn't the wealthiest person. 
I wasn't the most connected or the most established.

But I was the most prepared to talk about my vision. 

I was the clearest about what I needed. 

And I was the boldest about asking for it.

That combination of clarity + boldness + persistence opens doors that credentials alone never will.

Click the link below to read the full issue of the Boldness Framework and how to correctly present yourself in a room where you don’t even belong.

https://lnkd.in/ebu-Ms-W

37 Years of Silence. Then a £1.5 Billion Handshake.

For the first time since 1989, a Nigerian President made a state visit to the United Kingdom this week. Nearly four decades without a single state visit from the leader of Africa's largest economy to one of its oldest and most consequential trading partners.

Over the week, I had meetings, attended receptions, roundtables and events alongside senior UK government officials, Nigerian ministers, business leaders and investors spanning finance, manufacturing, agriculture, infrastructure, fintech and beyond.

I sat with founders scaling across borders. I spoke with politicians who are genuinely rethinking what UK-Africa trade policy should look like. I met business leaders from Lagos to London who are not waiting for permission, they are building, investing and moving capital now.

And here is what the visit actually produced. $1.51 billion in investment commitments:
- £746 million export finance deal to modernise Apapa and Tin Can Island ports
- Twinings Ovaltine Original committing £24m to build its first manufacturing facility in Lagos. 
- Seven Nigerian banks now operating in the UK, supporting over 1,000 jobs.
- LemFi pledging £100 million over five years with London as its global HQ. 
- Kuda, Moniepoint Group, and Fidelity Bank PLC all scaling UK operations and Zenith Bank Plc opening in Manchester. 

For those of us who have spent years building the bridge between African enterprise and UK retail shelves, boardrooms and balance sheets, this visit felt like validation. 

The thesis that Africa's consumer economy is not an emerging opportunity. It is a present one. The question is whether you are positioned to benefit when they do.

Most celebrity brands fail within 18 months. Here's why.

Last week Masibu Manima and I hosted an event for talent managers on how celebrities and influencers should be structuring their brand deals, and how to build a celeb-led CPG brand with a long-term view, not just a quick launch.

We broke down what I call the 18-month cliff, the point where most celeb brands quietly die because the infrastructure, team, and deal structure weren't built to last.

I shared a framework on how to avoid it. How to build a brand that actually survives beyond the hype cycle.

If you want a link to the presentation, drop "CLIFF" in the comments. Must be following for me to send.

Someone HAS to tell you this: Aiming Small Is Keeping You Small.

Last month, I had coffee with two entrepreneurs. 

Both wanted to start businesses. Both had similar skills and resources.

➡️ Entrepreneur A: "I want to build a small consultancy. Maybe make £100K annually. Keep it realistic, you know?"

➡️ Entrepreneur B: "I want to dominate the UK market and expand globally. I'm thinking £10M revenue within five years."

Guess who attracted top talent? 
Guess who got investment meetings? 
Guess who the media wanted to interview?

Entrepreneur B. Every time.

"Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us..." - Ephesians 3:20

The Three Reasons People Choose Small Goals
❌ Reason 1: Fear of Embarrassment
"What if I say I want £10M and only make £1M? People will think I failed."
But £1M is still 10x more than the person who aimed for £100K and hit it perfectly.


❌ Reason 2: Imposter Syndrome
"Who am I to think I can build something massive?"
But who is anyone? Every massive success story started with someone who had no business succeeding at that level.


❌ Reason 3: Lack of Faith
"I don't really believe it's possible."
Then it isn't. Your goals are predictions of your future. If you can't believe it, you can't achieve it.

You think aiming small is safer. It's not. It's more dangerous.

Impossible goals are often easier to achieve than realistic ones.

Read the latest issue of my newsletter to learn the logic behind impossible goals and get the Impossible Goal Framework for yourself. 

Link: https://lnkd.in/ewUyVrNa

The Beauty Industry’s Global Growth Is Slowing Down Really Fast But Not the Way You Think.

We’ve moved from the post-pandemic 8% growth spikes to a more sober 4% through 2030. 

But if you look closer, people aren't spending less on their appearance; they are just spending differently.

The shift? 

The Mainstreaming of Aesthetic Treatments.

Non-surgical procedures like Botox, dermal fillers and laser treatments are now becoming a core part of modern beauty routines.

Here is why the $441B beauty market is shifting its weight:

✅ The Trade Down to Trade Up Strategy: Consumers are becoming value-first, not just price-conscious. People are swapping their $80 luxury face creams for $15 drugstore staples. 
Why? To save that "found money" for a $600 skin booster or Polynucleotide treatment.

✅ The Instagram Face (overfilled, frozen, identical) is officially dead. In 2026, the trend is High-Fidelity Aesthetics.
• The Goal: Undetectability.
• The Tech: Bio-stimulators and exosomes that tell your cells to work harder, rather than just filling a gap with volume. 

✅ Aesthetic clinics aren't just for the 45+ demographic anymore. Gen Z and Millennials are entering the market earlier, but with a different mindset: Prevention. They view skin health as a long-term asset to be managed, not a problem to be fixed once it breaks.

As the hype of celebrity brands and viral TikTok products fades, the winners will be the brands offering proven efficacy.

African beauty and personal care is currently a $10B+ market, and it is growing at an annual rate of 8%.

For a long time, there was a disconnect.

The market was dominated by global conglomerates that exported products designed for European winters or North American humidity.

Leaving African consumers to "make do" with formulations that didn't account for:
➡️ Melanin-rich skin and its specific relationship with hyperpigmentation and sun protection.
➡️ High-porosity, textured hair that requires intense moisture, not just "cleaning."
➡️ Sub-Saharan climates where dust, heat, and humidity demand entirely different chemistry.

The tide has officially shifted.

We are seeing the rise of A-Beauty: a new generation of African-built brands that aren't just "selling" to Africans, they are solving for them. 

These founders are merging ancestral wisdom with modern clinical science to create a new gold standard:

✅ Tailored Formulations: Brands like Uncover are fusing K-Beauty technology with African botanicals (like baobab and rooibos) to target acne and hyperpigmentation in tropical climates.

✅ Ingredient Sovereignty: We’ve moved past just exporting raw shea butter and marula oil. Brands like Suki Suki Naturals and 54 Thrones are processing these "miracle ingredients" on-soil, keeping the value and the efficacy within the continent.

✅ Inclusive Innovation: Products like "invisible" sunscreens that leave zero white cast on dark skin and scalp-care systems for braided hair are no longer "niche" requests. They are the market drivers.

The whitespace is enormous. The founders are here. The data is undeniable. 

I’m currently writing a whitepaper on this space. 
If you’d like me to send it once it’s out, let me know in the comments.

The biggest mistake investors make? Treating Africa like a country instead of 54 distinct markets.

Afridigest’s latest map shows a clear divide: countries with massive Economic Potential (bottom-right) vs. those with actual Investment Attractiveness (top-right).

But the UK-India-Africa Investment Corridor is currently building the bridge to close that gap. 

Here’s how the landscape is shifting in 2026:
 ➡️ Nigeria’s Efficiency Play 🇳🇬: The massive £746M UKEF-backed port deal isn't just about ships; it’s about moving Nigeria up the Y-axis by slashing the logistics tax that kills PE exits.

➡️ Uganda’s Value Jump 🇺🇬: Already high on Investment Attractiveness, Uganda is the "darling" of the new UK-India trilateral. With UK FDI stock in-country jumping nearly 90%, we’re seeing a shift from raw exports to high-value pharma and agro-processing.

➡️ The Ghana/West Africa Halo 🇬🇭: Total trade with Ghana has hit £1.5B, but the real story is the UK–West Africa Digital Corridor. It’s tackling the $7B trade finance gap, making the "Emerging 9" much safer for institutional capital.

The "Sleeping Giants" like Ethiopia and Tanzania (bottom-right) are the real targets for 2027.

As the UK ramps up regional export finance capacity to £3B+, we’re moving away from speculative growth toward operational efficiency.

Which of the Emerging 9 do you think breaks into the Top Tier 6 first?

That Meeting You're Avoiding Could Change Everything About Your Life

There's a meeting you've been avoiding for months.

Maybe it's with the investor who could fund your business. 
The client who could 10x your revenue. 
The mentor who could unlock your next level. 
The partner who could change your trajectory.

You know exactly who I'm talking about. Their name just flashed in your mind.

You've rehearsed the conversation a hundred times. 

You've written and deleted seventeen different emails. 

You've found forty-three reasons why "now isn't the right time."

Let's diagnose what's really happening when you avoid that crucial conversation:

You tell yourself: "I need to be more prepared" 
‼️Translation: I'm afraid they'll say no

You tell yourself: "The timing isn't right" 
‼️Translation: I'm afraid I'm not enough

You tell yourself: "I don't want to seem pushy" 
‼️Translation: I'm afraid of rejection

You tell yourself: "I'll reach out next week" 
‼️Translation: I'm afraid of success

That last one catches people off guard. I’ll tell you why.

Read the full issue of this week’s newsletter to find out why your discomfort is data and how to get a mindset shift.

Link: https://lnkd.in/ept9_hpW

Nike and adidas Lost 3% of Global Market Share to "Niche" Specialists (On, HOKA) In Just 5 Years.

Why is Nike struggling while SHEIN and Hermès are winning? 

It’s called the Barbell Economy. 

The "Bell Curve" of the 20th century has snapped in half.

The data is clear:
 ✅ Utility wins on Algorithm: If it’s a commodity, I want it at the floor price, delivered yesterday.
 ✅ Luxury wins on Friction: If it’s a dream, I want the heritage, the scarcity, and the "hard-to-get" factor.

The brands currently "collapsing" are the ones stuck in the centre, the ones that rely on a middle-class disposable income that is being squeezed out of existence.

Average is now the most expensive strategy you can have.

The Collapse of The Middle Brand

The $769M Popcorn Deal: How The Hershey Company Quietly Made One of the Smartest Acquisitions of 2025.

So whilst everyone was obsessing over Mars buying Kellanova for $36 billion and Nestlé snapping up Vital Proteins, The Hershey Company quietly closed a deal that might be the actual sleeper hit of 2025.

➡️ The acquisition: LesserEvil Brand Snack Co. (organic popcorn brand)

➡️ The price: $769 million cash upfront + up to $200 million earnout

➡️ The headline multiple: 3.2x revenue (or 4.0x, if earn-out hits)

For context: This is the 27th largest consumer M&A deal of 2025 according to Iris data.

Hershey bought a $242 million revenue organic snack brand at 3.2x sales in a market where “better-for-you” brands were trading at 5-8x revenue just two years ago.

Hershey structured the deal so brilliantly that they’re only assigning a 25% probability to paying the full earnout—meaning they got premium downside protection whilst giving sellers upside optionality.

Check out my newsletter to see what the SEC filings actually reveal—and why LesserEvil Brand Snack Co. might be the most underrated acquisition of the year.

Link: https://lnkd.in/eaG8zNuq

The €1B Question: How Huel's Founder Kept 49% Through Three Funding Rounds and Still Made £420M (While Most DTC Founders Get Diluted to 15%)


In 2015, Julian Hearn launched Huel with a simple idea: nutritionally complete food that was affordable, convenient, and scalable.

He started small: online only, no retail, no hype. Just a product that solved a real problem.

Within three years, Huel had grown to over £18M in revenue before raising a single round of institutional capital.

Now, Julian Hearn just sold Huel to Danone for €1 billion and walked away with £420 million personally.

That’s 49% of the exit proceeds going to the founder.

For context: Most DTC founders who raise $184M across three rounds end up owning 15-25% at exit.

Julian Hearn owned nearly 50%.
How?

Because he bootstrapped to $18M revenue before raising Series A—and even then, only raised what he needed, when he needed it, at valuations that didn’t destroy his ownership.

Let me show you the exact cap table math, the fundraising discipline that preserved 49% ownership, and why Huel’s unit economics are better than almost every VC-backed DTC brand—which is exactly why Danone paid 17-20x EBITDA (a premium multiple) despite revenue growth slowing to 17%.

Click the link in comments to read the full issue of my newsletter ⬇️

He Got Rejected on Shark Tank ABC and Built That Same Company into a Billion-Dollar Business in Five Years

In 2013, Jamie Siminoff was working out of his garage.

 He wasn’t a “tech mogul” yet; he was a guy who couldn’t hear his doorbell while tinkering away.

He built a solution called DoorBot.
He spent his last $10,000 to get on Shark Tank, seeking $700K for 10% of his company.

The result?

The sharks didn’t see the potential. 
Jamie walked off that stage with $0.
 He later admitted he went home and cried.
 
Broke, with a tiny team, and having just been told his “baby” wasn’t a business on national television.

But he didn’t scrap the idea.

He used the “Shark Tank Effect”, the massive spike in web traffic, to listen to his customers.
 
He realized people didn’t just want a doorbot. They wanted security.

So he rebranded: DoorBot became Ring.

He obsessed over the mission. 
It wasn’t about a doorbell, it was about reducing crime in neighborhoods.
 
He stayed lean, kept his team in the same garage, and focused on the product until it was undeniable.

The same product investors didn’t believe in was acquired by Amazon for about $1 billion in 2018.

A few years later, Jamie returned to Shark Tank… as a Guest Shark.

Next time you get a “No” on a proposal or a pitch, remember the guy with the doorbell.

Your garage phase is just the prologue. Keep building.

Some ideas don’t look like billion-dollar companies until someone refuses to drop them.

taplio

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Karunakaran Nagarajan

David Olusegun

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The Battle

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David Olusegun

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