About Me

The Short Version

I'm Sufyan Osamah, 28, based in New York. I build things, break down complex problems, and ship fast. Former McKinsey, VC-backed founder, and now building with AI.

Where I Come From

Born in Pakistan, I moved every two years growing up. By 11 I'd lived in seven cities. Then the UK, where I got my GCSE Math A* three years early. Back to Pakistan at 15. Germany at 17, where the minute I stepped off at Stuttgart bus station, I felt home for the first time in my life.

I did my bachelor's at ESB, exchange in Taiwan, MSc Finance at WHU. That constant movement taught me something I still rely on: how to land somewhere unfamiliar and figure it out fast.

The Career Arc

I started early — at 18 I was building BI dashboards at a startup and being called a genius with Excel (their words). At 20 I interned at Amazon, running FP&A for fulfilment centres across Europe. Then McKinsey, where I learned to structure any problem and communicate the answer clearly. Then Picus Capital, where I helped launch a FinTech from scratch — MVP, first customers, founding team.

But I always wanted to build, not advise. So in 2022 I co-founded HonestDog — a consumer marketplace bringing transparency to the dog breeding market in Europe. Raised $750K+, scaled to $25M annual GMV, and built the entire product from zero. It was the hardest and most rewarding thing I've done.

What Drives Me

I'm the person who checked out 100+ books from the library on dogs after losing a puppy to a preventable disease at age 9. Who organized Pakistan's largest powerlifting competition with zero budget at 17. Who published peer-reviewed research on reverse engineering options pricing because I got obsessed with the math.

I don't have a single genius-level skill. But I'm very smart, very disciplined, and I learn fast enough that the combination tends to surprise people.

Beyond Work

Outside of work: powerlifting (held a national deadlift record), table tennis (built League of Spin because I couldn't find people to play with), health and longevity optimization, anime (Goku shaped my growth mindset more than any business book), and dogs — I'm getting one the moment life calms down.

Education

• MSc Finance WHU Otto Beisheim School of Management, Germany (2020–2022)
• BSc International Business ESB Business School, Germany (2016–2019)
• Quantitative Finance Exchange NCTU, Taiwan (2018–2019)