Tekmetric has appointed Kristen Young as its first chief financial officer, adding a senior finance executive as the cloud-based auto repair software company scales a platform used by more than 15,000 shops nationwide.
Young will oversee Tekmetric’s financial organization as the company invests in product development, operational capacity and the infrastructure needed to support a growing base of automotive repair businesses. The creation of the CFO position adds a dedicated finance function at the executive level as Tekmetric expands its software and payments ecosystem.
The company provides an all-in-one platform that combines shop management, payments, marketing, technology integrations and real-time operational data. For independent repair shops, those systems sit at the center of workflows ranging from customer management and repair orders to payment processing and business performance tracking.
“Shops feel it when we invest in the right things: in the product, in how fast we move, in the support they get,” Tekmetric President and COO Lauren Langston said. She pointed to Young’s experience scaling software businesses as particularly relevant to the company’s current stage.
Young joins Tekmetric from Grammarly, where she built the finance function as the software company grew to more than $700 million in annual revenue. That experience included developing the financial infrastructure needed to support a rapidly expanding technology operation.
Before Grammarly, Young held several finance leadership roles at enterprise software company Pivotal and helped guide the organization through its acquisition by VMware.
She previously spent nearly five years at SurveyMonkey working across mergers and acquisitions, business development and business operations. During her tenure, she also helped take the company public.
Young began her career in investment banking at J.P. Morgan before moving into corporate finance and M&A at Booking.com. She holds an MBA from Harvard Business School.
The combination of software finance, M&A and operating experience gives Young a broad mandate at Tekmetric. As the company grows, the finance organization will play a role in determining how capital is allocated across product development, customer support and the underlying operations required to serve thousands of repair shops.
“My job is simple: make sure every dollar we invest makes Tekmetric better for shops and their customers,” Young said.
The appointment comes as software becomes increasingly embedded across the operational stack of automotive repair businesses. Tekmetric’s platform is designed to consolidate functions that shops might otherwise manage through separate systems, giving operators a common environment for running day-to-day workflows and monitoring business performance.
That consolidation creates its own scaling requirements for the software provider. Supporting more than 15,000 shops requires investment not only in new product capabilities but also in payments infrastructure, integrations, data systems and customer support. Adding a CFO with experience building finance organizations around high-growth software businesses gives Tekmetric additional oversight as those operations expand.
Young also brings a personal connection to the small-business market Tekmetric serves. As the daughter of small-business owners, she said she has seen the impact that software and operational tools can have on business owners.
“What drew me in was a team that leads with mission over ego, paired with the rigor to match,” Young said.
Tekmetric positions its cloud platform as an operating system for auto repair businesses, helping shops manage work, process payments, market to customers and use real-time data to track performance. The company says the software is intended to improve transparency, productivity and profitability while supporting the customer experience for vehicle owners.
With Young becoming its first CFO, Tekmetric is formalizing the financial leadership behind that expansion. Her immediate challenge will be applying the financial discipline and operating structure developed at larger software companies to a platform scaling across a fragmented auto repair market.
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