Name: Santhosh Kumar
New title: Chief information officer, Panera Bread
Previous title: Senior vice president and chief technology officer, United Natural Food
In Kumar’s new role, which he’ll start on Feb. 12, he will lead the company’s technology organization and will be responsible for developing, integrating and deploying tech at over 2,200 cafes, according to a press release. He will report to interim CEO Paul Carbone.
“As the technology landscape continues to evolve, Santhosh brings the right combination of strategic technology expertise, industry experience and proven ability to build high-performing teams that will help drive Panera’s continued success,” Carbone said.
Panera has been at the forefront of implementing various technologies in the past few years, such as testing drive-thru AI in 2022 and piloting Amazon One palm scanners in 2023. In 2022, it opened its first digital-only restaurant and added drive-thru pickup for mobile orders in 2023.
Kumar has expertise in core application modernization, retail point-of-sales and in-store systems, in addition to electronic payment technologies. During his stint at United Natural Foods, which lasted more than three years, he oversaw a multi-year warehouse transformation program and cloud modernization and migrations that improved the company’s operational efficiencies and yielded cost savings.
Prior to UNFI, he spent roughly two decades at Dunkin’ Brands in various information technology positions, including SVP of IT. In that position, he led the IT team across the world. He initiated several retail and digital innovations during this time, such as the installation of new POS and back-office systems across U.S. restaurants and the development and launch of Dunkin’s loyalty program.
Kumar is the latest hire at the bakery cafe chain, which also added a new senior vice president of brand and innovation and a vice president of culinary in January. That same month, the chain hired a chief development officer.
