MAM
Brands actively reaching out for partnerships since Covid2019: NODWIN’s Sidharth Kedia
NEW DELHI: The esports ecosystem might witness a slump of 15-20 per cent post-covid, but the numbers will still be 200 per cent higher than the pre-Covid2019 times, NODWIN Gaming group CEO Sidharth Kedia told Indiantelevision.com. The five-year-old gaming platform is one of the largest esports companies in India and is popular for pioneering several cutting-edge technology innovations in e-sports broadcasting.
Kedia shares that the esports ecosystem witnessed a growth of about 300 per cent during the past quarter. “If I talk about NODWIN, our property India Premiership saw 3000 people registering for the event in the summer of 2019. This year, the number was 57,000. And going by the early indication shared by our streaming partner Disney+ Hotstar, the viewership rose by three times from the last season,” he highlights.
Addressing the speculations about the expected dip post Covid2019, he notes, “If we look at the rise of e-wallets and digital payments during demonetisation and the subsequent dip in their popularity once the situation settled, we noticed that the users still remain on the higher end of the pre-demonetisation times. Same is with esports. Yes, we may expect a 15-20 per cent dip in numbers but it will be after a 300 per cent growth.”
Not just the number of users, the interest of brands has also increased in the e-sports category, given the magnanimous popularity it's enjoying.
“Brands have definitely gained interest in esports. Earlier, we used to spend months trying to get in touch with brands and striking partnerships. But in the past three months, I have got a call from 37 new clients, asking me how they can invest in esports,” shares Kedia.
“Yes, the marketing budgets are low these days; if a brand used to spend Rs 100 on marketing earlier, it is just spending Rs 20-25 now. But, while I was getting only three per cent earlier, now, the brands will be sparing 30-35 per cent for us from those 25 rupees. All the brands who want to reposition themselves or are trying to get the attention of the youth are investing in esports and it will continue even after Covid2019,” he elaborates.
Kedia also put the spotlight on the blurring lines between India and Bharat when it comes to e-sports in today’s time, attributing the growth in popularity of the platforms to increasing mobile penetration.
“Bharat population is much bigger on mobile platforms. Going by Google trends, if you search top ten cities using PubG mobile, most of them will be tier 2 and tier 3 cities. Even for us, when we streamed our latest tournament on YouTube, which reached around 40 million people, the top two languages in which users accessed the content were Hindi and Tamil. We got three million views on our Hindi streams for PMPL and the views for English were less than 10 per cent of it,” Kedia quipped.
To keep this momentum of growth going, Kedia and his team are investing highly in technology like distributed broadcast architecture using cloud technology. “We will continue to experiment with AR, VR, and mixed reality. Another important goal for us is to minimise the number of people in our offices and we are working towards that.”
Kedia believes that esports has a great future in India and is also planning to invest in talent management going ahead. To popularise NODWIN, he is actively indulging in brand partnerships, sponsorships, and attending various events and webinars to reach out to potential trade partners.
Brands
Boeing appoints Barun as head of FP&A for global engineering function
Seasoned finance leader to steer budgets and strategy across global centres
BENGALURU: Boeing’s finance cockpit has a new pilot, and he is no stranger to turbulence or transformation. Boeing has appointed Barun as head of FP&A for global engineering, placing him at the centre of financial strategy for its worldwide engineering and technology operations.
Based in Bengaluru, Barun steps into a role that is as expansive as it is critical. He will serve as the primary finance lead for Boeing’s Engineering and Technology Centers globally, working closely with executive leadership to shape financial decisions, manage complex budgets, and design scalable finance processes that support the company’s growing engineering footprint.
In a note announcing his move Barun said, “I’m excited to share that I’ve joined Boeing Global Engineering. This opportunity is incredibly meaningful to me not just from a professional standpoint, but also for what Boeing represents globally.” He added that he looks forward to contributing to an organisation that continues to shape the future of aerospace and innovation.
Barun’s mandate spans strategic financial leadership, operational oversight, and stakeholder engagement. From directing large-scale budgets and schedules to influencing long-term organisational goals, the role blends financial discipline with business foresight. He will also lead cross-functional teams and partner with finance colleagues worldwide to support engineering programmes across geographies, including India.
The appointment caps a long stint at Juniper Networks, where Barun spent over a decade, most recently as finance senior manager. There, he led FP&A for global product business units and G&A functions, driving budgeting, forecasting, and long-range planning. He also played a key role in enterprise-wide transformation, including spearheading an Oracle to SAP ERP migration and building advanced analytics capabilities using tools such as Tableau and SAP Analytics Cloud.
His earlier career includes finance leadership roles at Sony India Software Centre, Cognizant Technology Solutions, and Mphasis, where he focused on financial planning, governance frameworks, and operational efficiency across global delivery centres.
A chartered accountant from the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India, Barun brings nearly two decades of experience across financial planning, digital transformation, and analytics-led decision making.
His appointment comes at a time when global engineering operations are becoming increasingly complex and distributed, requiring sharper financial oversight and agile planning. With Barun at the helm of FP&A for engineering, Boeing appears to be tightening its financial playbook as it looks to scale innovation with discipline.
