Brands
Nokia ropes in Hitesh Chhabra as sales director
MUMBAI: Hitesh Chhabra, a veteran of the ICT world with over 23 years of experience, has jumped ship from Chinese tech giant Huawei to join Nokia as sales director this month. The move marks the end of a nearly 14-year run at Huawei, where he most recently served as director of enterprise solution sales and chief technology officer for the company’s enterprise business group in India.
During his tenure at Huawei, Chhabra led solution sales operations across India, with responsibilities ranging from yearly business planning and pre-sales team management to strategic consulting and C-level engagement. His role involved extensive customer interaction and sales team leadership focused on technology strategy execution.
Prior to his Huawei chapter, Chhabra cut his teeth at several tech heavyweights, including a two-year stint at Alcatel-Lucent (now part of Nokia), where he worked as a solution manager at the IP Transformation Centre. His CV also includes nearly four years at UTstarcom, where he served as senior network specialist and assistant manager at the Global Escalation Centre, and shorter tenures at Tata Consultancy Services and Cisco’s Technical Assistance Centre.
Known for his team-oriented approach and customer relationship development skills, Chhabra brings to Nokia his expertise in ICT solution sales, campus and enterprise networks, and strategic leadership—precisely the toolkit the Finnish firm will be keen to deploy as it battles for market share in the enterprise space.
Brands
Faber-Castell India appoints Sunaina Haldar as director – marketing
With stints at Tata, SleepyCat and ADF Foods under her belt, Haldar is primed to redraw Faber-Castell’s brand story
MUMBAI: Faber-Castell India has poached Sunaina Haldar from ADF Foods, appointing her director – marketing as the German stationery brand looks to muscle up in a category that is rapidly reinventing itself around creativity and self-expression.
Haldar hit the ground running. “My first couple of weeks have been incredibly energising, understanding consumers, visiting markets, engaging with retailers and immersing myself into the world of Faber-Castell Group,” she said.
She arrives with considerable firepower. At ADF Foods, Haldar ran marketing across India and international markets for a portfolio spanning Ashoka, Aeroplane, Camel and ADF Soul. Before that, she was vice-president – marketing at direct-to-consumer mattress brand SleepyCat, where she helmed brand, content and performance marketing. Her résumé also includes a stint leading marketing, new product development and CRM for Tata SmartFoodz at Tata Consumer Products, no small proving ground.
Between corporate roles, Haldar also operated as a fractional CMO for early-stage startups, building marketing strategy and operational structures from scratch, a signal that she knows how to move fast with limited resources.
With 18 years straddling FMCG, D2C and the startup world, Haldar now takes the reins at a brand that has long owned the classroom but is clearly hungry for the living room. In a stationery market where the pencil has become a lifestyle statement, Faber-Castell has picked someone who knows exactly how to sell that story.
