Brands
Coca-Cola crowns Kaustuv Gupta with African strategy assignment
GURUGRAM: From Gurugram to Gauteng, and from fizz to full throttle. Kaustuv Gupta has cracked open a new chapter at The Coca-Cola Co, taking charge as senior director, strategy – Africa operations, one of the beverage giant’s most sprawling and complex theatres.
Gupta’s new remit spans 54 African countries, a portfolio where demographics are young, competition is thirsty and growth is anything but flat. Based in Johannesburg, he will shape strategy for a region that Coca-Cola views as both a proving ground and a long game.
The appointment caps an eight-year run inside Coca-Cola’s strategy engine. Gupta previously led strategy for India and south-west Asia, after steering planning for Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan and the Maldives. Before that, he handled strategy and insights for the India and south-west Asia business unit — the sort of internal apprenticeship that prepares executives for bigger maps and harder calls.
Before Coke, Gupta was part of Zomato’s breakout years, helping scale the business and launching Zomato Gold, the loyalty play that rewired how urban India ate out. Earlier stints include a bruising, boots-on-the-ground role as regional sales manager at Castrol India (BP group) and a brief spell in media planning at Mudra Communications — giving him a rare blend of strategy, sales and media literacy.
An alumnus of MDI Gurgaon, where he was a gold medallist in marketing, and Hindu College, Delhi University, Gupta also moonlights as a guest lecturer, teaching product management and marketing — proof that PowerPoint is not his only export.
Africa is no soft drink. It is fragmented, fast-growing and fiercely local — a continent where strategy has to travel light and execution has to sweat. Coca-Cola clearly believes Gupta has the fizz, the formula and the stamina.
From delivery bikes to bottling plants, from India to Africa, this is one career that refuses to go flat.
Brands
UK’s OnlyFans seeks US investor at $3bn valuation after owner’s death
The adult video platform is seeking stability after the death of its billionaire owner
LONDON: OnlyFans is looking for a new partner. The London-based adult video platform is in advanced talks to sell a minority stake of less than 20 per cent to Architect Capital, a San Francisco-based investment firm, in a deal that would value the business at more than $3bn (£2.2bn).
The move is driven by an urgent need for stability. Leonid Radvinsky, the Ukrainian-American billionaire who owned OnlyFans, died of cancer last month at the age of 43, leaving the future of one of Britain’s most profitable privately held businesses suddenly uncertain.
The choice of Architect Capital is not arbitrary. The firm has deep expertise in financial services, which aligns neatly with OnlyFans’ ambitions to offer banking products to its creators, many of whom have long struggled to access basic financial services because of the nature of their work.
The numbers behind OnlyFans are, by any measure, staggering. The platform posted revenues of $1.4bn in the year to 30th November 2024, with a pre-tax profit of $684m, up four per cent on the prior year. Payments to creators totalled $7.2bn over the same period, a rise of nearly ten per cent. Radvinsky personally collected $701m in dividends from the business in 2024 alone, on top of more than $1bn in such payments he had already received. The platform, run through its parent company Felix International, hosts 4.6m creator accounts, with performers keeping 80 per cent of subscription proceeds and the platform pocketing the remaining 20 per cent. It has 377m fan accounts in total.
The current minority stake talks represent a notable scaling back of ambitions. In January, OnlyFans was reported to be in discussions with Architect about selling a majority stake of 60 per cent. Before that, the company had explored a sale to a consortium led by Forest Road Company, a Los Angeles-based investment firm. Neither deal materialised.
OnlyFans has built an enormously lucrative business on content that mainstream finance has long refused to touch. Now, with its owner gone and a $3bn valuation on the table, it is looking for the kind of respectable institutional backing that might finally persuade the banks to take its calls.
