MAM
Hero Cycles, Cycle Agarbatti and Duracell associate with ‘PK’ for effective marketing
MUMBAI: This decade saw a number of in-film product placements as it has become the most pursued marketing strategy to gain prominence with every potential blockbuster.
Hero Cycles, Cycle Pure Agarbathies, and Duracell batteries have partnered with Rajkumar Hirani’s latest offering ‘PK’ in which these brands will be featured in a seamless manner. Go Fish Entertainment has been instrumental in getting these brands to associate with the movie.
Hero Cycles co-chairman and MD Pankaj Munjal said,” We are excited to be associated with the movie ‘PK’ which is one of the most anticipated movies this year. In the movie, Anushka Sharma’s character uses bicycles from Hero Cycles’ Miss India Jade range. The range has been especially designed to complement the taste of the new age girl and goes well with the character of Anushka in the movie. We look forward to the movie’s upcoming success and hope that our new range of cycles is equally well-received by the customers.”
Cycle Pure Agarbathies MD Arjun Ranga stated, “We take pride in being associated with the year’s most awaited chartbuster movie. With this partnership, we not only intend to build brand saliency, but also aim at connecting with the consumer at a more emotional and serious level”.
He further added, “While brands foresee entertainment as a serious platform to communicate, brand and media managers have been conscious about advertising in multiple platforms and blockbuster movies are looked upon as one of the strong platform for brand recall and reinforcing consumer trust”.
Go Fish Entertainment with more than nine years in the industry has built a strong equity in this domain, which is its forte and has been successful in getting various brands recognition and strategic presence via relevant tie ups with films. Emphasising on how subtly these brands have been affiliated with the movie script, Go Fish Entertainment director Sajay Moolankodan said, “Brand integration with Bollywood has been evolving in its courtship. The crux of this affiliation lies in identifying the right opportunity for placement of products in the movie, taking care that the products are not blatantly placed. A lot of brainstorming and research work goes into making it a perfect fit between the brand and the film. While we figured out that the integration of a prominent incense brand will match a temple worship scene in the movie, Anushka’s character in the script also seemed to be apt forthe attributes of the Miss India Jade Range of Hero Cycles.”
Producer and director, Rajkumar Hirani shared his thought about this association, “It is a pleasure to be associated with Hero cycles, Cycle Agarbathies and Duracell, as it was just the perfect fit for the scenes that we had envisaged in the film. As a result, all parties have derived value from this association without compromising on the viewing experience of the audience.”
Brands
Amazon doubles down on Anthropic with $25bn AI investment plan
Deal locks in massive compute capacity and pushes Claude deeper into AWS stack
MUMBAI: Amazon and Anthropic have significantly expanded their strategic partnership, committing to a long-term collaboration that combines billions in fresh investment with one of the largest AI infrastructure deals to date.
At the heart of the agreement is Anthropic’s plan to spend more than $100 billion over the next decade on AWS technologies. This includes access to up to 5 gigawatts of compute capacity powered by successive generations of Trainium chips, alongside tens of millions of Graviton cores. The scale signals a clear intent to future-proof the infrastructure behind its fast-growing Claude models.
In parallel, Amazon will invest $5 billion in Anthropic immediately, with the option to add up to $20 billion more tied to performance milestones. This builds on the $8 billion the tech giant has already committed to the AI firm.
The collaboration also tightens product integration. Anthropic’s full Claude Platform will now be accessible directly within AWS, allowing developers to use its native tools without leaving their existing cloud environment. The models are already widely used through Amazon Bedrock, where more than 100,000 customers are running Claude for tasks ranging from customer support to scientific research.
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said, “Our custom AI silicon offers high performance at significantly lower cost for customers, which is why it’s in such hot demand.” He added that Anthropic’s long-term commitment to Trainium reflects the progress both companies have made in building scalable AI infrastructure.
Anthropic CEO and co-founder Dario Amodei said, “Our users tell us Claude is increasingly essential to how they work, and we need to build the infrastructure to keep pace with rapidly growing demand.” He noted that the partnership would help advance research while serving a rapidly expanding user base.
The two companies have already been working closely since 2023. Their joint efforts include Project Rainier, a massive AI cluster featuring hundreds of thousands of Trainium chips, now used to train and deploy newer versions of Claude. The new agreement extends this momentum, with fresh capacity expected to come online through 2026, including next-generation Trainium3 and Trainium4 chips.
Anthropic’s growth has been equally striking. The company says its annualised revenue run rate has crossed $30 billion, up sharply from about $9 billion at the end of 2025, driven by surging enterprise and consumer demand. That rapid uptake has also strained infrastructure, making this expanded deal as much about stability as it is about scale.
The partnership will also expand globally, with increased inference capacity planned across Asia and Europe, ensuring Claude’s reach keeps pace with its popularity.
From powering ride-hailing support systems to accelerating drug research workflows, Claude’s use cases continue to broaden. With this deal, Amazon and Anthropic are not just adding more compute, they are doubling down on a shared bet that AI’s next leap will be built on deeper, tighter integrations between models and infrastructure.
If the past few years were about proving the promise of generative AI, this alliance suggests the next phase will be about building it at industrial scale.
