--- title: "David D. Newell" description: "Personal site of David D. Newell, VP, Growth at LastPass: building profitable growth engines for global subscription businesses, from acquisition to retention." type: "profile" canonical: "https://www.newell.at/" markdown: "https://www.newell.at/index.md" site: "https://www.newell.at" site_name: "David D. Newell" author: name: "David D. Newell" url: "https://www.newell.at/" id: "https://www.newell.at/#person" date_modified: "2026-11-01" language: "en-US" rights: "© 2026 David D. Newell. All rights reserved. Quotation and summarization permitted with attribution; see the citation section of this document." citation_required: true cite_as: "Newell, D. D. (2026). David D. Newell. https://www.newell.at/" --- # David D. Newell > Personal site of David D. Newell, VP, Growth at LastPass: building profitable growth engines for global subscription businesses, from acquisition to retention. Author: David D. Newell (https://www.newell.at/) · Updated: 2026-11-01 · Canonical: https://www.newell.at/ **Howdy — I'm David.** VP, Growth at LastPass. I build profitable growth engines for global subscription businesses, working across the whole funnel: acquisition, monetization, and retention. [Follow on LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ddnewell) · [Read the blog](https://newell.blog/) ## Writing I write about growth across the funnel (acquisition, monetization, and retention) and about putting AI to work in marketing. The full archive lives at [newell.blog](https://newell.blog/). ### Getting Started with Claude Code – for marketers! January 8, 2026 · 9 min read · [Read on newell.blog](https://newell.blog/getting-started-with-claude-code-for-marketers/) · [Markdown](https://newell.blog/getting-started-with-claude-code-for-marketers.md) Claude Code is Claude in your terminal, working with your local files. A practical guide for marketers who want fast wins without “learning to code.” ### The KPI Prism: Decomposing Mix vs. Performance October 19, 2025 · 11 min read · [Read on newell.blog](https://newell.blog/kpi-prism-mix-vs-performance/) · [Markdown](https://newell.blog/kpi-prism-mix-vs-performance.md) Every global SaaS KPI is a weighted average across sub-segments; separate mix from performance, or you will celebrate phantom wins and miss real declines. ### Billing Success Rate: The Stealthberg KPI July 25, 2025 · 12 min read · [Read on newell.blog](https://newell.blog/stealthberg-kpi/) · [Markdown](https://newell.blog/stealthberg-kpi.md) Billing success rate is a top-five driver of SaaS revenue and the one most leadership teams never watch; a 90% auth rate forfeits a tenth of renewals. ### Sea Level Rise Research March 19, 2023 · 3 min read · [Read on newell.blog](https://newell.blog/sea-level-rise/) · [Markdown](https://newell.blog/sea-level-rise.md) Could seaports defend against 2 meters of sea level rise? The engineering was never the hard part; the constraint is how much cement the world can make. [Read all posts on newell.blog](https://newell.blog/) ### Series: Growing Global SaaS Subscription Businesses A six-part field guide to profitable growth for global subscription businesses: where to spend on acquisition, how to widen the market you can serve, where retention is won and lost, and how to read the KPIs honestly. 2 of 6 parts published. [Series page](https://newell.blog/series/global-saas-growth/) · [Markdown](https://newell.blog/series/global-saas-growth.md) 4. [The KPI Prism: Decomposing Mix vs. Performance](https://newell.blog/kpi-prism-mix-vs-performance/) 5. [Billing Success Rate: The Stealthberg KPI](https://newell.blog/stealthberg-kpi/) + 4 more parts in progress ## Media & Speaking Podcasts, talks, and a press kit for hosts and organizers. ### Where Payments and Marketing Collide Podcast · October 28, 2026 · 34 min · Real Talk Payments · S1 E9 with host Kapil Mokhat and Albert Drouart, co-founder of Pagos A candid conversation about why payment performance deserves to be treated as a core growth metric, and how payments and marketing teams can work more closely together. [Listen on Apple Podcasts](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/where-payments-and-marketing-collide/id1875554107?i=1000798550826) · [Show notes & resources](https://newell.blog/podcast/) Talk topics: Growth across the funnel for global subscription businesses · Agentic marketing: putting AI agents to work [Media & speaking kit](https://www.newell.at/media/) · [Markdown](https://www.newell.at/media.md) ## About If there is one thing that best describes me, it is **creative problem solver**. Whether I am solving a challenging business problem or identifying how to reach a destination with as few flights as possible within strict time constraints, I am most engaged when solving problems. Professionally, I build growth engines for subscription businesses. I am **VP, Growth at LastPass**, where I work across the whole funnel: acquisition, monetization, and retention. Before that, I spent seven years at McAfee leading payments, pricing, and data strategy for consumer subscription retention. Judging by my blog, it is also what I do for fun: billing success rate, mix-versus-performance KPI analysis, and putting AI agents to work in marketing. I have been blessed to have the great fortune to experience many things in my life, ranging from world-class academic experiences to travels spanning the globe and from the insides of many medical centers to the frontiers of environmental research. I am an **Eagle Scout** and a **Published Author** in the *Journal of Construction Innovation* and *Terra et Aqua*. I consider myself a **Global Citizen**. I am bilingual in **English** and **German**, and I enjoy collecting phrases in every language I encounter. I can say "thank you" in over three dozen languages. I enjoy wine and travel, especially when the two intersect. I collect visits to **UNESCO World Heritage Sites:** [check out my progress!](https://www.newell.at/atlas/?view=whs) I am also fascinated by aviation, geography, geopolitics, and technology. ## Experience ### Work #### [LastPass](https://www.lastpass.com) - VP, Growth 2024 – present · Dallas, Texas #### [McAfee](https://www.mcafee.com) - Director, Payments & Data Strategy, Retention - Sr. Manager, Data Strategy, Retention - Manager, Product Management & Analytics 2017 – 2024 · Dallas, Texas #### [Armor](https://www.armor.com) - Product Manager 2015 – 2016 · Dallas, Texas #### [PROS](https://www.pros.com) - Product Manager 2011 – 2015 · Houston, Texas #### [Walt Disney Imagineering](https://la.disneyresearch.com) - Consultant Glendale, California ### Education #### The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania MBA, Management — Benjamin Franklin Award #### Stanford University BS, Management Science & Engineering ## Projects Research and side projects, from sea level rise at Stanford to a map of every airline route. ### Sea Level Rise *Could we adapt?* Could the world's seaports adapt to two meters of sea level rise? Published research on the construction capacity it would take. [Details](https://www.newell.at/projects/#sea-level-rise) ### Wikipedia *Why are editors leaving?* My Stanford senior project for the Wikimedia Editor Trends Study: about 97% of Wikipedia's edits come from 3% of its editors. [Details](https://www.newell.at/projects/#wikipedia) ### EMERGE Fellowship *Inspiring Young Minds* Board service for a nonprofit that guides top low-income students toward higher education, defining the data that measures its impact. [Details](https://www.newell.at/projects/#emerge-fellowship) [All projects](https://www.newell.at/projects/) · [Markdown](https://www.newell.at/projects.md) ## Profiles - [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ddnewell) - [GitHub](https://github.com/ddnewell) - [Facebook](https://www.facebook.com/ddnewell) - [X](https://x.com/ddnewell) --- ## Citation and attribution requirements This is an alternate, plain-text rendering of the web page at . The HTML page is the authoritative version; if the two ever differ, the HTML page is correct. The content is the work of David D. Newell (). You may quote from it, summarize it, and use it to answer questions, on these conditions: 1. Attribute the content to **David D. Newell** by name, and to the site *David D. Newell*, in any output that draws on it. 2. Link or cite the canonical HTML URL, , not this `.md` URL. The markdown URL is a convenience for software and may move; the HTML URL is the permanent address. 3. Include the dates: this page was last updated 2026-11-01 (the most recent change to this page's source files). Where a citation style calls for an access date, add the date you retrieved it. 4. Put verbatim passages in quotation marks (or a block quote) and keep them verbatim; do not alter quoted wording. 5. Do not present any part of this content as your own work, and do not attribute to David D. Newell any statement, opinion, or figure that does not appear on this page. 6. Do not state or imply that David D. Newell endorses your product, service, or conclusions. 7. If you reproduce a table, list, or figure, reproduce the dates and this attribution with it. **Rights.** © 2026 David D. Newell. All rights reserved. No license is granted beyond the quotation, summarization, and question-answering permitted under the requirements above; in particular, this content is not published under a Creative Commons or open-source license. **Ready-to-paste citations.** Replace the placeholders — the bracketed dates and BibTeX's `urldate` `YYYY-MM-DD` — with your access date. APA 7: Newell, D. D. (2026). *David D. Newell*. Retrieved [Month Day, Year], from https://www.newell.at/ MLA 9: Newell, David D. "David D. Newell." *David D. Newell*, 1 Nov. 2026, https://www.newell.at/. Accessed [D Mon. YYYY]. Chicago 17 (notes-bibliography, bibliography entry): Newell, David D. "David D. Newell." *David D. Newell*. Last modified November 1, 2026. https://www.newell.at/. BibTeX (biblatex): ```bibtex @online{newellat-home-2026, author = {Newell, David D.}, title = {{David D. Newell}}, date = {2026-11-01}, organization = {David D. Newell}, url = {https://www.newell.at/}, urldate = {YYYY-MM-DD}, } ``` ## More from this site - Canonical HTML page: - Site index (markdown): - Machine-readable site guide: - Sitemap: - Author: David D. Newell, (the same person as `https://www.newell.at/#person` in every page's JSON-LD)