Brands
Top notch marketer Lara Balazs joins Adobe as CMO & EVP
MUMBAI: She’s found her corporate abode in Adobe. The cutting edge software firm today announced that former Intuit chief marketing officer (CMO) & general manager, strategic partner group, Lara Balazs has joined it as CMO & executive vice president. She will be having a direct reporting line to Adobe chair & CEO Shantanu Narayen.
At Intuit, Lara was really into it, re-imagining the company’s brand and go-to-market activities to support its AI-driven financial technology platform and elevated its brand awareness and reputation to new heights.
Balazs will lead the global marketing organisation responsible for Adobe’s renowned brand, Adobe.com, the company’s industry-leading events, campaigns, communications, social media and its best-in-class media operations and marketing insights.
“As Adobe continues to deliver industry-leading product innovations across content creation and digital marketing, Lara’s unique experience across B2C and B2B industries and deep insights as an Adobe customer will help us engage our growing universe of users more effectively while expanding Adobe’s brand reach and impact,” voiced Narayen,
Balazs’ marketing career spans key leadership roles at some of the world’s most respected brands such as Amazon, Visa and Nike, delivering innovative customer-centric marketing strategies that propel transformational growth. Among her notable achievements are driving the growth of Amazon Prime and Visa globally and leading Visa into the era of digital payments, with the launch of mobile-first products such as Visa Checkout and Apple Pay. At Intuit, she led the protax group to its highest, most sustained growth in years and drove the company’s highest brand awareness and corporate reputation in its four decades.
Named to Forbes’ list of the world’s most influential CMOs and a recipient of AdWeek’s CMO Vanguard award, Balazs is passionate about advancing the marketing profession and supporting the social impact of the industry.
Balazs holds a bachelor of arts degree in pre-law from the university of Washington and a master of business administration from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.
Brands
Airtel, Jio, Vi quietly raise tariffs with tweaks ahead of major hike
Airtel, Jio and Vi test subscriber response with subtle plan changes
NEW DELHI: India’s top telecom operators, including Bharti Airtel, Reliance Jio and Vodafone Idea, are quietly reworking their prepaid plans in what appears to be a calculated run-up to a broader tariff hike expected later this year.
Rather than announcing headline-grabbing price increases, the operators are opting for subtle tweaks that are less likely to trigger immediate consumer backlash. Industry observers describe this as a “testing the waters” approach, where small changes help gauge subscriber sensitivity while gradually improving revenues.
Among the most visible moves is plan pruning. Airtel has discontinued its popular Rs 799 pack, widely seen as a high-value offering, while nudging up the price of its Rs 859 plan to Rs 899. The changes may seem marginal, but across millions of users, they translate into meaningful revenue gains.
Reliance Jio, on its part, has taken a sharper route by slashing the validity of its Rs 195 plan from 90 days to just 30 days. The price remains unchanged, but the value per day has dropped steeply, effectively raising costs for consumers without altering headline tariffs.
Meanwhile, Vodafone Idea is restructuring its “NonStopHero” packs, limiting unlimited data benefits to night hours in several circles. The move trims usage flexibility while keeping plan positioning largely intact.
Another common tactic is bundling. Operators are increasingly pairing plans with OTT subscriptions such as streaming services, framing price adjustments as value additions even when the core offering remains largely unchanged.
The broader goal behind these moves is to lift ARPU (Average Revenue Per User), a key profitability metric in the telecom business. Airtel is targeting an ARPU of around Rs 300, up from roughly Rs 250, while Jio is under pressure to demonstrate stronger revenue growth ahead of a potential IPO. For Vodafone Idea, the urgency is more immediate as it seeks higher cash flows to fund 5G expansion and manage outstanding dues.
Industry estimates suggest that these incremental changes are a precursor to a larger, industry-wide tariff hike of 15 to 20 per cent, likely towards the end of 2026. The delay in announcing a full-scale increase is partly due to macroeconomic concerns, including inflation and volatile fuel prices, which could dampen consumer sentiment.
The push to monetise 5G is also gathering pace. After investing more than Rs 3 lakh crore in next-generation networks, operators are expected to gradually phase out free 5G data and reposition it as a premium service.
For consumers, the impact is already visible in small but steady increases in monthly bills. For telcos, however, this is a carefully choreographed build-up, easing users into higher spending before the bigger pricing reset arrives.
