MAM
EA Sports, Fifa extend licensing deal till 2022
MUMBAI: EA Sports, a division of Electronic Arts and soccer‘s governing body Fifa have announced an extension of their existing licensing agreement until 31 December 2022.
Under the terms of the agreement, EA Sports maintains exclusive rights to release Fifa-branded action and management videogames. In addition, EA Sports also holds exclusive rights to release the official Fifa World Cup videogame, as well as retaining its status as a presenting partner of the Fifa Interactive World Cup.
EA Sports executive VP and head Andrew Wilson said, “EA Sports released the first Fifa-branded football game in 1993, and 20 years later our partnership with FIFA continues to be very strong. Our franchise has become the benchmark for quality and innovation in the sports videogame genre, and we look forward to many more years of connecting with consumers around the world with our games carrying the prestigious Fifa name.”
Fifa secretary general Jérôme Valcke said, “Our relationship with EA Sports is of high importance to Fifa. The Fifa videogames are a key experiential component in our work to communicate the Fifa brand and its values all over the world. This is highlighted by the 2.5 million football fans that have competed in this year‘s Fifa Interactive World Cup, which is just one example of the power of our partnership with EA”.
MAM
Smytten appoints Shishir Varma as CEO of Pulseai Research
Rebranded AI platform scales with 150 plus clients and 30 million users.
MUMBAI: In a world obsessed with what consumers say, Smytten is betting on what they actually do. The company has appointed Shishir Varma as chief executive officer of Pulseai Research, signalling a sharper push into AI-led, behaviour-driven consumer insights. The move comes as Smytten rebrands its insights vertical from Smytten PulseAI to Pulseai Research, marking a shift away from traditional, project-based research towards a more continuous, intelligence-led model.
Varma brings over 30 years of global experience across APAC markets, including India, China and Japan. Most recently managing director, Insights at Kantar Japan, he has built and scaled consumer insight businesses across geographies, including playing a key role in establishing Millward Brown in India. His mandate now: turn Pulseai into a category-defining platform in a space still dominated by surveys and static reports.
The pitch is straightforward but ambitious. Instead of relying on claimed responses, Pulseai Research taps into observed behaviour leveraging Smytten’s ecosystem of 30 million users built over a decade of product discovery, trials and purchases. The idea is to close the long-standing gap between what consumers claim and how they actually behave.
The numbers suggest early traction. In under 18 months, the platform has onboarded over 150 enterprise clients across sectors, pointing to growing demand for faster, more reliable alternatives to legacy research models.
Under the hood, the platform blends behavioural data with AI and large language model-led analysis to deliver real-time sentiment tracking, scalable qualitative insights, faster quantitative studies and always-on brand intelligence. In practical terms, that means compressing research timelines from weeks to days without sacrificing depth.
The ambition extends beyond FMCG. Pulseai Research is positioning itself as a cross-category intelligence layer, spanning auto, education, gadgets and emerging consumer segments anywhere behaviour-rich data can sharpen decision-making.
For Smytten, the leadership hire is less about optics and more about direction. With Varma at the helm, the company is leaning into a simple but powerful premise: in the age of AI, insight isn’t just about asking better questions, it’s about watching more closely.
