Brands
Adidas creates shortest hashtag #III, Sharma, Rahul & Pant superheroes
MUMBAI: Adidas is all set to blow away cricket fans with the launch of its latest digital campaign titled #III, cricket’s shortest hashtag – #III, aiming to make the hashtag synonymous with cricket. Interestingly, the three “I’s” in the “#III” not only look like the three stumps of cricket but also give a visual representation of the trademark three stripes of adidas. The idea behind the campaign is to keep hashtags concise and crisp, in line with the tenets of social media. The campaign is being led by adidas athletes Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul and Rishabh Pant and each ‘I’ in the #III, represents each one of them. As part of the campaign all three athletes will come together as the adidas #III squad, to become cricket’s first 3D superhero squad who are here not merely to play the game but to entertain audiences at extraordinary levels.
The #III Squad (or the cricket squad) of Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul and Rishabh Pant will regale audiences on field with their explosive performances and off-field with fictional storytelling around the game. These three superheroes will live two lives – one with fantastical superpowers and the other with cricketing powers.
“As the world’s leading sports brand, we decided to establish the world’s shortest hashtag that represents the game – #III. We also realized that it was time to bring back the excitement to the cricket season and hence decided to push our athletes to go beyond just being sportsmen. Today audiences are seeking entertainment in the sport of cricket and we felt that the time was right to showcase Rohit, KL and Rishabh as the explosive players and entertainers that they are. What better than their superhero avatars to showcase their super abilities.” said adidas India director – Heartbeat Sports & Outdoor Business Unit Dhanashree Sowani.
During the upcoming cricket season, the #III squad will give epic live commentary through GIFs and cinemagraphs on social media especially during matches. The superhero avatars will also be placed at prominent malls and adidas stores in New Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore. adidas will also giveaway limited edition merchandise to winners of online contests that will be run on the adidas cricket social media handles.
Brands
Tessolve lands a semiconductor veteran to drive its next big push
Ravi Kumar Chirugudu, who started his career at ISRO and has spent 35 years building chips and companies, joins the Bengaluru-based firm as president and chief operating officer
BENGALURU: Tessolve has never been shy about its ambitions. The Bengaluru-based engineering services firm already counts 18 of the world’s top 20 semiconductor companies among its clients, employs more than 3,500 engineers across 12 countries, and last year pocketed a $150m investment from TPG. Now it has hired the executive it believes can turn those assets into something bigger. Ravi Kumar Chirugudu, a 35-year semiconductor veteran who once built satellite payloads for ISRO and has since scaled engineering organisations across three continents, joins as president and chief operating officer, effective immediately.
THE MAN AND THE MANDATE
The appointment is, by any measure, a serious hire. Ravi Kumar Chirugudu comes to Tessolve after senior leadership stints at HCL Technologies, Altran and Wipro, where he managed large profit-and-loss portfolios and oversaw cross-regional teams. Over the course of his career, he has been instrumental in bringing more than 1,000 new products to market across the high-tech, energy and manufacturing verticals. Before the private sector claimed him, he began his working life as a scientist at the Indian Space Research Organisation, contributing to research and development in charge-coupled device technology and satellite payloads, a foundation that shaped everything that followed.
In his new role, he will lead Tessolve’s global growth strategy: expanding its engineering capabilities, deepening customer relationships and accelerating innovation across semiconductor and high-performance computing domains. The brief is broad, but the context is specific. Tessolve operates in the $550 billion global semiconductor market, and its recent moves, the acquisition of Germany’s Dream Chip Technologies and the TPG funding round, have sharpened both its reach and its expectations.
Srini Chinamilli, co-founder and chief executive of Tessolve, is characteristically direct about why Ravi Kumar Chirugudu was the choice:
“As we scale our global semiconductor and system engineering capabilities, Ravi’s appointment marks an important step forward. As global semiconductor demand continues to accelerate across industries, it is creating significant opportunities across the semiconductor lifecycle, from design, packaging, validation and systems integration. Ravi’s deep knowledge and leadership in this ecosystem brings the right mix of industry expertise, customer connect and execution capability, which will play a key role in strengthening our position as a trusted global engineering partner and reinforcing our market leadership.”
THE NEW ARRIVAL SPEAKS
Ravi Kumar Chirugudu, for his part, frames the move in terms of timing and culture, two factors that veteran executives tend to weigh as heavily as title or compensation:
“I am happy to join Tessolve at a time when the industry is rapidly evolving towards more complex, AI-driven systems. What stands out to me is its strong people-first culture and its commitment to bringing value to its customers. The strength of its global team, combined with its deep expertise in semiconductor innovation and next-generation product engineering, creates a solid foundation to build differentiated, scalable solutions. I look forward to working closely with the team to drive strategic growth and strengthen its role in shaping the global semiconductor ecosystem.”
The reference to AI-driven systems is not incidental. The semiconductor industry is in the midst of a structural reshaping, driven by the insatiable compute demands of artificial intelligence. For engineering services firms like Tessolve, which offers end-to-end capabilities from silicon design to packaged parts and invests in high-performance computing, high-speed interfaces, photonics and 5G, the moment is both an opportunity and a test. The company says it is well positioned to capture the next wave of industry growth. Ravi Kumar Chirugudu is now the person who has to prove it.
He came in from outer space, literally, and spent three decades learning how the semiconductor industry works from the inside out. Now Tessolve is betting that accumulated knowledge can help it cross the next frontier. In the $550 billion global chip market, the gap between ambition and execution is measured in engineering hours and leadership quality. Tessolve has just gone shopping for both.
