Kamal Srinivasan, SVP of Product Development at Alludo, joined us on LaunchPod this week to share how his team modernized CorelDRAW into an AI-enabled, collaborative SaaS product, while navigating the delicate balance between innovation and continuity.
But that’s not all.
We also dive into a pivotal moment in Kamal’s career: how he handled a major roadmap misalignment with senior leadership, including the tactics he used to realign the team and the framework he developed for balancing short-term revenue goals with long-term product bets.
This episode is packed with practical lessons on product transformation, stakeholder alignment, and building AI that powers real workflows, not just flashy features.
From legacy software to AI-powered SaaS
CorelDRAW has been around for 30+ years. It’s beloved by professional designers, but Kamal knew that wouldn’t be enough in the age of new AI-enabled tools and innovations by favorites like Canva and Figma.
“The premise we started with was this idea of democratization. Everybody's a content creator of some sort. They're all trying to be that designer who used to be an entire creative department.”
But building for both longtime power users and new users wasn’t simple.
Kamal’s team took a hybrid approach:
Their "Ideas Portal" helped prioritize needs of longtime users
Drop-offs in trial onboarding, activation metrics, user testing, and early usage data revealed blockers for newer, less mature users
The result? A shift from heavyweight desktop software to a lightweight, service-oriented design tool accessible across devices.
And AI was core to making that shift feel magical.
“If you upload a bitmap image, we automatically trace it. Now you can edit it like you created it yourself. You remove the background. You manipulate the vectors. And this is what makes you feel like you're a pro.”
He’s not just layering AI on top. He’s using it to rethink entire workflows—helping users go from “a single output to hundreds.”
Navigating roadmap misalignment at the highest level
In another part of the conversation, Kamal shared how he handled a serious product strategy clash with leadership.
It involved another Alludo product, Parallels.
“There was this big inflection point. People didn’t agree with where we were going.”
Kamal didn’t try to win the debate in a single meeting. He broke down the resistance, one objection at a time.
“You deconstruct that no, and then you start chipping away at it.”
He over-communicated. He took the story wide. He got allies. And he used examples like Microsoft’s journey with Xbox and Azure to show that great product bets don’t always look like slam dunks at the start.
He also shared his “squiggly line” framework for navigating the tension between short-term revenue and long-term vision.
“How do I still make that quarter or that half revenue goal, but actually take the next big step forward? Sometimes the line is squiggly, but the slope is in the right direction.”
Links
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kamalsrinivasan/
Resources
Tell Your CEO They're Wrong (And KEEP Your Career) | Steve Nash, Dir. Product (GumGum) | LaunchPod:
Chapters
00:00 Intro
01:56 From PhD to Product Management
02:47 The Value of a PhD in Product Management
05:26 Challenges in Modernizing Legacy Products
06:11 Understanding Vector Graphics Design
09:47 Democratizing Design Tools
16:23 User Feedback and Product Development
19:49 Incorporating AI in Design Software
21:43 Integrating AI into Design Workflows
22:51 Enhancing Productivity with AI
24:15 Proactive Issue Detection with AI
27:21 Understanding Parallels Virtualization
29:50 Challenges and Strategies in Product Development
38:20 Effective Communication and Leadership
41:52 Conclusion and Future Plans
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